Touhou Yousai: The Western Impact
by FinnOtaku
Summary: During the RED's attempt to fend off the BLU team out of their base, the TF mercenaries find themselves transported to a mysterious land filled with magic, humanoid creatures and new hats. How did this happen, who are the girls, and - most importantly - how will they get back?
1. Chapter 1: Prologue

**東方要塞 ~ The Western Impact**

_Touhou Yousai ~ The Western Impact_

Touhou Project / Team Fortress 2 crossover fanfiction by FinnOtaku

I don't own the games that are being used as the base of this work of fiction. Touhou Project is owned by Team Shanghai Alice and Team Fortress 2 is owned by Valve.

* * *

**Chapter 1: Prologue**

* * *

"Jeez! How can this be so frustrating?" Scout blurted after his failed attempt to find more rag.

"I've told ya, boy, these are some delicate artifacts here. Wouldn't want them to crumble in a heat of battle for something like a misplaced component", Engineer uttered, making adjustments on his sentry's laser sight.

"Ugh... Why do I even have to help you with this... Electrical clean-up service?" Scout said, pointing at the remnants of Engineer's dispenser he had been cleaning for the last 2 hours.

"Feel free to fix that shotgun yourself. It's not my problem, really", Engineer replied with an impassive tone.

Scout was about to give one of his witty replies, but decided to hold it in. Out of the few things he hasn't claimed his superiority on, weapon maintenance was one of them. Sure, he does know how to clean his shotgun and all, but apparently when it comes to putting it back together after using it as an emergency bat...

"There, done", Engineer stated as he had finished his business with the sentry, "And that didn't even take the whole night... Scout, how's it going with the teleporter parts?"

"Well, I've cleaned most of these and... Wait, the hell? These are from the teleporter?" Scout asked while pointing the metal around him he had assumed to be from Engineer's dispenser, mostly because of it's ridiculous amount.

Even though this was the third time for him to ask that same question after Engineer had told him for about four times what parts he had been cleaning, Engineer simply replied with a "Yes". He has spent enough time with the Scout to know his lack of concentration on certain things. Most of the time these things tented to be the most crucial ones, which makes him a bit of a walking... No, a running miracle for still being alive.

But seems like he has done something well for once, Engineer thought as he glanced over the cleaned piles of metal.

"I'll fix that Force-A-Nature of yours next, as I promised for your help. But seriously, boy, how on earth did it end up like this?" Engineer picked up the parts of the Scout's shotgun. Or at least, that's what they vaguely resembled.

"That fat, bald bastard surprised me, alright!" Scout blurted, "I didn't know it'd brake that easily!"

Engineer would've wanted to push his luck a bit further, but he decided to let it slide.

"If ya say so, I see what I can do", Engineer said.

BOOM!

A lightning struck the facility, blacking out Engineer's room.

"Darn... We know that the place is called the Thunder Mountains, thank you very much!" Engineer yelled at the ceiling, in hopes that it'd reach those of the higher authority.

* * *

Badlands, New Mexico. It's the year of 1968.

For over a century, this piece of land has served as the scene of feud between the greedy sons of Zepheniah Mann.

For over a century, their efforts to take over the land from one another has ended up in a never ending stalemate.

For over a century, most of the people have been oblivious of this fact and were there just for the pleasure of killing.

And it'll be left that way, as the story that's about to unfold won't be about these two brothers, but the mercenaries hired by them.

Reliable Excavation Demolition had successfully fended off Builders League United that day, as the latter had attempted to bomb one of the RED's facilities in the northern parts of Badlands. This particular facility in question is commonly referred to as Badwater Basin among the mercenaries.

The BLU's mercenaries had planned to transport the bomb by railroad tracks to the facility's dump site, as they had found out that the RED had been using it as a storage pit for a hazardous waste. Why gather so much highly explosive material in one place? That seemed to be a mystery even among the RED's mercenaries.

But even so, the attempt ended up to be a failure as the RED team had learned of the attack just in time to prepare countermeasures. And after the BLU team's initial attempt to push the cart, they had no choice but to retreat as they realized being overpowered by their enemies.

After the BLU's retreat, the RED team had returned to their base of operation in the Thunder Mountains, north of the Basin. They had left Pyro to keep guard in the facility and Demoman to examine the bomb, both being eccentric professionals on their respective fields.

The day started slowly turn into night, as the RED began to prepare for their next showdown with their rivals. But little did they know that this night would mark a journey of their lifetime, and that they won't be the only team to join for the ride...

* * *

Engineer's room was situated right across the Thunder Mountain's spiral tower, the central point of the RED's base of operation. Out of one window, he had a view of the the tower and most of it's surroundings. Out of another, he had a view of the distant mountains and the nearby hills, latter being slightly covered with spruces. It also gave him a good view on a bridge, commonly known as the point B. Engineer had specifically requested this room as it was the nearest to the team's rendezvous point, giving him sufficient amount of time to pack his things up even in the cases of emergency, such as the one they had today.

He had pretty much redecorated the whole room for his needs, as the majority of the room was filled with his gadgets, blueprints, crafting tools and piles of metal of varying quality. According to him, the only things left from the previous decor were the electrical panels on the wall and a bed, latter being faintly visible under the piles of metal.

But the only con he had found about this room... No, about this whole facility is that whoever build this place, never got around to enforce it properly. As the area was infamous for it's ever raging thunderstorm, lightnings had been causing blackouts around the facility in about every half an hour. Much to Engineer's annoyance, as it evidently fell on his shoulders to fix the damages every time the facility blacked out.

And about that much time had gone since the last blackout...

* * *

Well, what do you know, putting this gun back together took much less time than I had anticipated, Engineer thought.

"Yes! I'm done! I'm finally done with this crap!"

And seems like the Scout managed to do his share as well.

"Taking care of your stuff isn't something I'd call crap, boy", Engineer said.

"Yeah, whatever. You're done with my gun, Engie? Hand it over", Scout said.

Maybe I should just try and say something as obnoxious in return, Engineer thought.

"Yeah, I've fixed your stupid crap, yo. Next time try shooting with your bat, y'all", Engineer said as he tried the best he could to mock Scout's attitude.

And that certainly gave a peculiar expression on Scout's face. It took him 10 seconds to reclaim his shotgun and about the same amount of time to finally speak up his mind.

"What's your problem, man?" he replied.

Is he really that ignorant? Engineer thought. But as the Scout was about to leave the room...

"Oh, hold on a moment", Engineer said. Still dumbfounded look on his face, he turned to Engineer.

"Have ya seen a red notebook around here? About this size?" Engineer asked as he formed a pocket-sized rectangle with his fingers.

Scout's change of expression showed that he was rather surprised by this sudden question. The following expression in turn showed that he was going through the last couple of hours of his life, but evidently he had to settle for a simple "No".

"I see. Carry on", Engineer said as he turned his attention back to his table.

A bit confused, Scout headed out to the thunderstorm.

"Where on earth could that notebook be?" Engineer muttered to himself as he was checking his table's drawers, "I can't log these maintenance records wherever I want."

BOOM!

A lightning struck the facility, blacking out Engineer's room.

"And you can be pretty darn sure that this isn't helping!" Engineer yelled at the ceiling, in hopes that it'd reach those of the higher authority.

* * *

"Spy, you sure this is the place?" Heavy asked as the BLU team had made their way to the Thunder Mountain facility.

"There's no mistaking it", Spy claimed as he took out a red notebook, "everything in these notes indicate that they've been using this facility as their base of operation for the last four weeks."

"But zese notes only show what was repaired and when", Medic said with a doubtful voice, "how is it that you came up with ze where?"

Spy gave out the notebook for others to read.

"Where else could one get a four pages worth of blackout reports within 24 hours?" he asked his teammates.

After seeing the notes, others weren't really that surprised for him to end up in that kind of conclusion.

"But Spy, you really sure we can act without that woman's permission?" Heavy asked him nervously, referring to the Administrator.

It has been an unspoken rule among the mercenaries to let the Administrator know about their plans, as those not doing so were supposed to be - in her words - "punished most severely". Though no one was really sure about what this punishment held in, no one had really dared to give it a try either. She knowing everything about them and they knowing nothing about her was one of the things keeping the mercenaries at bay. But this didn't seem to worry the Spy, as a smirk spread across his face.

"I believe that policy is to prevent us not to do anything uncalled for, oui?" Spy said, "But with this kind of opportunity to raid our enemies' base, I'm sure she'd forgive us for not contacting her. And besides", his tone went serious, "I think it's about time to get our revenge on these bastards, to show them that it won't be the color red that always prevail!"

"Now that's what I wanna see!" Soldier said, eagerly loading his rocket launcher, "Let's go kill some maggots!"

As the Soldier rocket launched himself on the nearby rooftop, the four of them split up around the facility, the Medic tagging along with the Heavy.

* * *

Seems like I'm getting too used to this, Engineer thought. He had just found the burnt out fuse and replaced it without the help of a flashlight, something he wouldn't have been able to do in about a week ago.

Since the control room was near the place he had been using as a sentry spot, he had taken it along to set it up to watch over the place. It's not that he's betting on someone to show up, it's just one of his force of habits.

After he had upgraded his sentry to the level 3, he decided to go back and reassemble his teleporters. But as soon as he got back to his room, his phone started ring. That made him remember that he had told Demoman to call him, once the Scotsman had finished his business with the bombcart. And seems like his guess was right, after hearing the voice on the other side of the line. But after realizing the state of the voice on the other side of the line...

"Oh, good night, Irene..." Engineer muttered, while he used his hand to form a palm on his face.

"Everyone thinks I'm just a one-eyed bloody monster, goddamit", the intoxicated Scotsman mumbled on the line, "Engie, why you no love me?"

"Demo, have you ever heard of the term 'safety regulations'?" Engineer asked sarcastically.

Seriously, what is it with him and drinking on duty? Engineer added in his mind.

"Me can't help when they wanna hug me and me wanna hug them and then we all wanna have a hugging good time!" Demoman mumbled, followed by a rather impressive(?) burp.

It took Engineer all of his willpower to not ask what his drunken companion was talking about. But even so, he still had to somehow ask about the state of the bombcart. Assuming the cart was like all the others, how was it he did it the last time...

"Demo, do you remember how I asked you to check out the bombcart?" Engineer began to persuade.

"The bombcart? Me check the bombcart, it was one hell of a (hiccup) cart with a bomb, 'cause it's a bombcart so it has a bomb."

This might be even easier than the last time, Engineer thought, he's still relatively sober.

"Remember how we left you there with the Pyro?" Engineer continued.

"Yeah, they're still both running around like a bunch of drunkards doing the spicy... Spy-cicle... Spy check!" Demoman managed to find the correct term for Pyro's activity.

Engineer would've wanted to remind him that their team only had one Pyro, but decided to went on with his interrogation.

"Remember how there was nothing out of ordinary in the cart?" Engineer asked bluntly.

"Me do, lad", Demoman said, not realizing the oddity of the question, "All the carts, all the same, all having 'Cry some more' written on 'em. Why they make fun of me injury, Engie?" Engineer thought his phone was acting up after Demo's rant, but then realized it was the sound of the Scotsman's weeping on the other side of the phone.

But as he had confirmed that the bombcart didn't need any additional procedures, he was more than relieved to conclude this conversation.

"I'm sure it's not their intention, fella", Engineer tried to comfort Demoman, "But anyhow, you stay there with the Pyro for the night, just in case the BLU would have something up their sleeves."

Though even if they would, I think it'd just fall on Pyro's shoulders to fend them off, Engineer thought.

Demoman had managed to cease his weeping.

"Thanks, mate", Demoman mumbled, "Wanna have a word with the Pyro?"

Okay, now he's definitely losing it, Engineer thought as he recalled his own attempts to have a conversation with that muffled pyromaniac.

"Nah, I'm fine. Take care", Engineer said, closing the phone.

Thank god we don't have to do this that often, Engineer thought. And with that out of his mind, he finally began to reassemble his teleporters. To make his task a bit more interesting, he set himself a goal that he would be finished by the time the next lightning strikes.

* * *

Something's not right here, Spy thought as he had reached the facility's spiral tower without any interference.

Even if we had tried to sneak our way in, they should have noticed our presence by now.

As he was checking the tower's surroundings, he had confirmed that there were about four cameras focused on him at the moment.

As the RED's security was based on identifying the people with the opposing team's color, he was rather surprised that they didn't trigger the alarm as soon as they had set their foot in the facility. And as he had just strolled his way to the central point of the facility, he was getting rather suspicious on whether the notes he had stolen were part of some kind of a trap. He doesn't like the feeling of someone else doing his thing, being a one step ahead of him.

Boom!

A lighting struck on one of the faraway mountains.

The thought of cameras malfunctioning in a 24/7 thunderstorm crossed his mind.

Well... I suppose that's possible, Spy thought, but tried to discard the idea for being far too convenient.

He decided to stay cautious as he began to stroll around the tower, beginning his sightseeing from the building with a big A sign on it. But as he had made his way to the interior of the building...

Beep... Beep...

He quickly withdrew his leg as he heard the familiar sound behind the corner.

A sentry! So they _are_ here after all, Spy thought triumphantly.

He took out his Disguise Kit, did a little eeny, meeny, miny, moe, and that way settling with a Pyro disguise.

Then he walked up to the sentry, which didn't seem to be accompanied by his Engineer, much to Spy's pleasure.

Seems like the gods are favoring me this day, Spy thought, even though he didn't really believe in any.

"Why hello, handsome", Spy said as he took out his sapper.

* * *

This must be a new record for me, Engineer thought, as he had achieved his personal goal with ease.

He had managed to reassemble both of his teleporters within 30 minutes, and now only thing left to do was to test drive them. He set both of his teleporters on the table, after clearing it of his gadgets. Both of them began slowly to turn on as the Engineer took out some metal from his pile to test the connection between them. But as he was about to take out his wrench to hasten the teleporters' process, one of his PDAs began to beep.

"Huh, that's strange", Engineer said, reaching out to the PDA, "Did I made some wrong calibrations on the sen..."

His eyes widened, as he saw the gauge representing his sentry's energy diminishing on his PDA. And the only thing able to make it happen this steady would be...

"Spy's sappin' mah sentry!" Engineer yelled as he made it to the window facing towards the tower.

He saw the Pyro coming out of the A building, slowly following the railroad tracks towards the point B.

Seems like he's not aware that we've left the Pyro in the Basin, Engineer thought. But how, how could've he found out about our base of...

His mind suddenly went back to the Badwater Basin, to the time when the Spy had desperately tried to sap his sentry during the BLU's attack. But right before the BLU had retreated, the Spy's last odd attempt... The notes!

"Dagnabbit!" Engineer cried out as he had realized the attempt's chain of events, "I knew he went down too easily back then!"

The PDA's beeping ceased as the sentry's energy gauge had disappeared from the screen.

Engineer took out his wrench and shotgun.

"Let's go give 'im some Southern Hospitality..." he said as he left his room, heading downstairs to the point B.

He barely gave any thought on how the Spy had managed to figure out their base's location. After all, this was probably the only place in Badlands to be able to fill a four pages worth of blackout reports within a time span of 24 hours.

* * *

Spy had decided to remain in his disguise as he thought it would give him an advantage, should he come in contact with the Engineer. He had reached the point B, but the Engineer was nowhere to be seen, as were none of his other gadgets.

Strange, I thought sapping his sentry would've caught his attention, Spy thought, glancing up to the sky and it's thunderclouds.

"Merde... Maybe I should go check their control room next", Spy said. If sapping the Engineer's sentry hadn't caught his attention, maybe sapping their communications would do the trick. But as he was about to leave...

"You're a looooong way from France, boy", Engineer had appeared right across the bridge behind the Spy, with a shotgun in his hand.

Seems like choosing the Pyro was a bit of a mistake, Spy thought. But it seemed like he didn't really mind about this turn of events as he took off the mask, revealing the smirk on his face.

"Surprised, cowboy?" Spy asked, taking out his knife.

"You've got some guts to drop by out of the blue like that, Spy", Engineer said, getting closer to his nemesis.

"It's not my fault if your surveillance isn't up and running, hardhat", Spy said.

That made Engineer grunt a bit. It's not that he had wanted to neglect that matter, it's just that fixing a whole surveillance system takes time. A lot of time, and every lightning would just throw him back to the square one.

Seriously, who the hell build this place, Engineer thought.

"Well, what do you know, seems like the blackouts aren't your only problem after all", Spy said, after seeing the Engineer's irritated look.

So he _did_ stole them, Engineer thought about his notes' fate.

"Doesn't matter", Engineer tried to restrain himself as he loaded his shotgun, "I'm gonna lay you out right here, Frenchman!"

The Spy's smirk faded as he got more serious.

"Why don't we try and settle this thing with my knife and your wrench?" Spy said with a serious tone, "I'm sick of your way of hiding behind the shadows of your toys, Engie! Don't you have guts to fight mano-a-mano?"

It might have been because of the way things have gone for him today, but the Engineer found that challenge a bit tempting. As the things had gone better than expected until now, beating the Spy in his own game sounded like a perfect fit in the continuum.

Engineer set his shotgun aside, taking out his wrench.

"I'm feeling lucky today, boy", Engineer said to his rival, "Let's do this Texas style."

Spy was pleased to see him take it seriously.

"I'm going to gut you like a Cornish game hen", he said as their weapons began to clash.

* * *

Back at the Engineer's room, the teleporters had finally turned on and began to spin. But as they began to spin faster and faster, the entrance part of the teleporter suddenly began to move away from it's initial position, slowly towards it's counterpart. The entrance was slowly closing in to the exit, bit by bit, until they eventually collided, sending the entrance flying across the room right towards one of the room's electrical panels. The entrance crashed on the panel, getting stuck by the top half of the device, leaving the base spinning in the place of the top.

The impact made the exit's top half being partially detached from the base, making the top wobble as it kept spinning. The top half soon made contact with the table, completely detaching it from the base. The impact sent the device right through a window, and straight towards the spiral tower. As the things were heating up on the point B, the device came in contact with tower's roof, sending it up in the sky right towards an incoming...

BO-

* * *

Ran found herself being torn up inside by her conflicting emotions. While it was supposed to be her time to go wake up Yukari from her slumber, she hasn't been able to bring herself to wake up her shikigami, currently sleeping on her lap.

"Oh, what should I do?" Ran muttered to herself, "If I don't go wake her up now, who knows what she'd come up with as her next punishment."

Ran shivered, as she recalled the last time she was punished by her master. For not bringing sweets from the Human Village as asked, Yukari had punished her by disabling her arms and putting an ice cube sliding down the back of her neck. Trying to neglect this memory, her eyes began to wander around the backyard of the Yakumo household, until they made contact with Chen's sleeping face. After watching her in silent for a moment, she found herself petting Chen's head again before she knew it.

"I can't help it, she's just so cute!" Ran tried to hold her voice back, and the same went for her nosebleed.

But after petting Chen's head for a moment or two, she finally managed to take control of her urge and redeem herself.

"No, no, no, this won't do Ran Yakumo", she told herself, "You have to be a role model for your shikigami, to show her the right from wrong. The right thing to do now, is to go and wake up our master. Yes, that's right. And to do that, I need her to move off my lap. And to move her, I need to... God, this isn't helping!" Ran fell over her tails, utterly defeated by her train of thought.

...Oh, the hell, Ran thought as she got back up, this is getting ridiculous, I'll just wake her up and be done with this, I'm sure she'll understand.

But now she had to come up with the how, since she didn't want to go all rough on her shikigami. She needed to do something that wouldn't outright break her sweet daydream, something that would gently bring her back from her dreamland, something...

An overwhelming feeling of presence suddenly crashed through Ran's body, making her instinctively stand up to confront the source. But for much of her surprise, the sudden feeling wasn't seemingly accompanied by any likely candidate. Her eyes were locked on the spot she had felt to be the source of that feeling, up in the bright morning sky. But as nothing seemed to come up, she eventually calmed down.

"Was it just me, then?" Ran wondered out loud, "But still, why does this situation feel so familiar..."

"Ran-sama, what was that for?" Chen finally spoke up to her master, with a bit of a teary eyes.

Only then Ran realized that she had forgotten about her shikigami as she had stood up. And from the looks of it, the result was Chen's head meeting the pavement, and that leaving an ugly bruise on her forehead. This gave Ran an almost instantaneous panic attack.

"Oh my god, I'm sorry Chen!" Ran said, kneeling down to meet Chen's eye level, "Are you okay?"

"I think I am", Chen said, wiping her few tears, "but my head's hurting a bit."

"Just hold on, I'll go get some bandai..."

-OM!

Suddenly the sky began to distort, forming a gap in the sky. And as the gap became larger and larger, it eventually shot a huge, red ball of light towards the ground. About a halfway to the impact, the ball split into several smaller parts, all of them beginning to spring back and forth around the air as they parted. As the balls began to hit the ground, the impact of each landing sent piles of orange and yellow particles high in the sky. These particles seemed to be of no harm, as they vanished as soon as they came in contact with the ground.

By the time the last of the balls had crashed on the ground, the gap had already disappeared. The only thing left from the spectacle were the particles, gently falling down to the ground.

Shocked by the sight she had just witnessed, it took Chen quite a while to finally speak up.

"Ran-sama... Wha... What was that?" she managed to say in her confusion. But it was then she noticed the change of her master's expression. An uneasy expression.

So that's why it felt so familiar, Ran thought.

"Chen", Ran said to her shikigami, "it seems like I have to go to see that red-white shrine maiden, you can find bandaids from the second left cupboard in the kitchen."

"Uh... Okay", Chen said as she was taken a bit aback by her master's sudden change of behavior.

"Also, wake up Yukari", Ran said before taking off to the particle filled sky, "and tell her we might have some visitors."

* * *

Chapter 1 Afterword:

Hello, this is FinnOtaku, the guy who's about to try and write a serious fanfic about Team Fortress 2 characters crossing over to the Touhou world. For many years, I've been a fan of crossovers, always eager to see how characters from other worlds and/or series interact with characters from another. This theme also tend up to appear in my own fantasies, but for many years, I've had to keep them for myself as I didn't know any (socially acceptable) place to share them. That was, until a couple of weeks back, I found this website. Yuka Kazami crossing over to the _Zero no Tsukaima_ world? Touhou heroines doing SSB? How is it possible that I had missed this heaven on earth? And could I be a part of it? ... O_O

Thus, I've decided to try and write a story about two of my favorite things from the east and the west. Reviews would be appreciated as this is my first time writing down my fantasies, or doing a fanfic in a first place. But more than anything, try to enjoy the upcoming ride as that's what I'm really trying to achieve by writing down this story =)


	2. Chapter 2: Morning of the Western Impact

**東方要塞 ~ The Western Impact**

_Touhou Yousai ~ The Western Impact_

Touhou Project / Team Fortress 2 crossover fanfiction by FinnOtaku

I don't own the games that are being used as the base of this work of fiction. Touhou Project is owned by Team Shanghai Alice and Team Fortress 2 is owned by Valve.

* * *

**Chapter 2: Morning of the Western Impact**

* * *

Gensokyo, the sealed world of magic and fantasy. The Land of Illusions where the humans and monsters alike live in harmony within it's borders.

Many incidents have taken place in this world - no doubt more yet to come - and some of them were caused by former residents of the outside world. No one really knows how it's done, but from time to time people, artifacts and even mansions have found their way in this secluded world. Some say it's caused by the Gap Youkai, some say they've been spirited away, but nevertheless, none ever seemed to have witnessed the event, when one crosses over the border to this world. People have only imagined what such an event would look like in their minds.

That was, until this one particular morning. The one that would be remembered as the Morning of the Western Impact.

* * *

"Ow! What on earth was that?" Engineer wailed as he had finally managed to get back on his knees.

He remembered that he and the Spy were exchanging blows, both being surprisingly equal in that, when all of a sudden an impact had come out of thin air, sending him flying across the bridge and hitting the wall in one of the corridors leading to the point. This made Engineer black out for a moment, but it seems like the Spy hadn't taken the chance to finish him off, seeing that he found himself from the same corridor he had passed out.

As he made it back to the bridge, the Spy was nowhere to be seen.

Could've he ran away, Engineer thought, after all that bravado...

Engineer tried to figure out what had happened, when he noticed the yellow-orange particles falling down from the sunny sky.

"Teleportation?" Engineer said out loud as he recognized the particles.

He had once been researching the cause of these particles, and had come to the conclusion that they were a side effect of splitting a subject into atoms in point A and reassembling them back together in point B, gathering atomic waste on the way. But the thing that had grabbed his attention was the amount enough to make it look like a yellow-orange snowfall. And the thing was, this much atomic waste would've been caused by a teleportation of a subject with a mass approximately equal to that of a...

Sunny?

The Engineer finally realized the contradiction, as he noticed the prevailing state of weather. Sunny? In the Thunder Mountains? Evidently, the discovery made Engineer notice the change of scenery as well. The scenery of the distant mountains and the nearby hills had been replaced by treetops, giving him an expression of an overview of a forest. And as he was observing his surroundings, he noticed that the facility looked like it had been roughly cut from the mountain, and pasted as roughly on it's current location.

Though reluctant to admit it, he had only one plausible explanation: the facility had somehow ended up to be a subject in a large-scale teleportation, sending the facility - along with him, at least - to a location he's yet to identify. But from the looks of it, the facility's current location was nowhere near Badlands.

As he began wonder what and who could've caused such a large-scale teleportation, he remembered that he had left the teleporters on their own in his room. Not that he assumed them to have something to do with this, as he knew that such a feat was far beyond the device's capacity. He decided to go back to his room and check them out, still keeping an eye out in case of the Spy.

* * *

Marisa had spent her whole morning in the depths of Forest of Magic hunting mushrooms, ending up with two full bags worth of delicacies. Satisfied with her haul, she finally decided to head back home, with Alice carrying the other bag.

"Man, I'll be so feasting tonight!" Marisa bragged cheerfully as she walked along a faint road, Alice following the black-white witch with two of her dolls floating beside her.

"Marisa, why do I have to carry one of your bags?" Alice asked with an annoyed tone as this was not what she had in mind, when Marisa asked her to "take a walk with her in a forest".

Apparently Marisa found that question a bit odd as she gave a confused look on Alice.

"What do you mean 'why'?" she replied, "You think I could carry both of these bags myself? Are you stupid?"

The last three words gave Alice an urge to bomb Marisa with one of her dolls, but she had to hold herself back as she didn't want her friend to be judged by Shikieiki just yet. This was one of those moments she wished that Marisa would've been something much more durable than a human being, and - moreover - stopped acting like she could take on the world whenever she liked. Especially with that kind of a bag in her shoulders.

"Gee, who knows..." Alice stated sarcastically, Marisa being seemingly oblivious to read between the lines.

"By the way, Marisa", Alice said suddenly with bit of a worried voice, making Marisa turn attention to her, "how come you're so relaxed? One of those things just now didn't really crash that far from here. Aren't you worried?"

Some of the particles were still falling, when Alice brought this up. They had both witnessed the red light show that had taken place a few moments earlier, and both had prepared their weapons to encounter anything that might have followed the crash in the forest. But since nothing out of ordinary had popped up, Marisa had leisurely proceeded with her hunt.

"Well, it's not that I'm not worried or anything", Marisa claimed, "I just thought that if the one responsible had been as flashy as that light show, we would've seen a herd of gargoyles and whatnot by now."

Or maybe you're just being too naive, Alice thought. And why gargoyles?

As they both kept arguing whether they should be more cautious, they failed to notice that something had cut off their designated road. And it took them to get about three feet away from it to finally notice the sight before them. Or rather, above them, which made Alice to take a few quick steps back and arm her dolls, out of surprise.

The thing that had surprised her was a huge log, hanging by a rope. That was as much as she managed acknowledge, as she realized that making quick movements with a huge bag of mushrooms might've not been the best idea. The extra weight of the bag made her lost her balance, ending up falling down on her back.

Marisa, who had also taken a few steps back and managed to maintain her balance, seemed to find the puppeteer's little incident amusing.

"Pfft... She fell on her ass", Marisa snickered, making Alice blush a little.

"Sh... Shut up!" Alice yelled with an embarrassed voice, with her embarrassment being further manifested by a sudden wobbly movement of her dolls. Even though one might forget, she _is_ the one controlling them, and situations like these could make her lost her focus, causing her dolls to stagger for a brief time.

"What if someone had tried to drop that thing on us?"

"But no one did, ze?" Marisa said with a carefree tone, as she had went ahead and began to poke the log with her broom.

As it was true that nothing had really happened, Alice decided to leave the case be as she got back up to examine what she could see beyond the log.

The log was hanging from a wooden building, resembling what Alice could describe as a barn, in the case of appearance. To the right of the building, she could see a complex of other buildings, with the nearest of them having a giant "RED" written on it. To the left of the barn building, she could see a separate building, that in turn had "BLU Industries" written on it. As she didn't really understand the meaning behind these labels, other than that the latter might've been missing an E, she turned her attention to a detail she found to be a bit more peculiar. She wasn't sure if it was just her, but the edge where this... place met with the ground seemed a little off. To her, it looked like as if someone had roughly cut it from the place where it belonged, and pasted it as roughly on it's current...

A mixed feeling of shame and realization finally hit through Alice's body. The shame for taking this long time to realize the obvious, and the realization... well, for a rather obvious reason.

"Marisa", Alice said, "could this be..."

"Yeah, most probably", Marisa said as she had apparently came to the same conclusion. The place they were gazing upon must've been the thing that had crashed in the forest during the earlier spectacle. "Well then, shall we?"

The way Marisa said the last part made Alice flinch and turn her attention to the witch.

"I beg your pardon?" Alice asked, even though she had a pretty good idea on what kind of thoughts were running through the black-white witch's mind at the moment.

A huge grin spread on Marisa's face.

"A treasure hunt, Alice! Treasure hunt!" Marisa exclaimed with excitement, "That place is bound to be filled with stuff from the outside world!"

I knew it, Alice thought as she went to stand between Marisa and the mysterious facility.

"Marisa, let's just go back home with these mushrooms, okay?" Alice said slowly, trying to prevent the upcoming chain of events, "Let's just wait until someone like Reimu check the place out and..."

The smile went even wider on Marisa's face.

Oh my god, Alice thought as she realized her horrible choice of words. Marisa was almost synonymous to "someone like Reimu" when it came to these kind of things. But Alice didn't want to give up just yet.

"Y... You know, there could be vicious beasts in there, just waiting to attack anyone who stumbles upon their territor..."

Marisa took out her Hakkero, her eagerness now practically shining on her face.

Oh, who am I kidding...

"After you", Alice muttered as if she had been defeated in a Danmaku battle, making way for Marisa.

"Yay!" Marisa bursted, as they both floated their way beside the barn building and began to investigate the place.

* * *

"What in Sam Hill happened here?" Engineer let out as he had got back to his room.

He was pretty certain that he hadn't left his room with such a mess when he had went to confront the Spy. One of the teleporters had somehow ended up crashing on one of the room's panels, and the only thing left from the other one was the base. As he was furiously looking around, trying to figure out what had happened, the first scenario he had to reject was that it would've been the work of the Spy, because of the lack of the sappers. The second scenario he had to reject was that it would've been caused by the teleportation, because his pile of metal would've surely fallen over as well.

After his moment of rage, he finally took notice of the broken window, the one that was facing towards the tower. This almost made him to go on another rage, but he managed compose himself as he sat on his chair.

After he had finally managed to calm down, he began to plan how to handle the situation. First off, he decided to go and pick up the remnants of his sentry, checking whether the teleporter exit would be somewhere along the way. As he didn't know when would be the next time for the BLU to strike, he felt that repairing his gear should come first for putting up the defenses. Then, he'd check around the facility, gather his team and plan the next move with them.

Having the main parts of his plan figured out, he got up and began to make his way to the sentry spot, still keeping an eye out in case of the Spy.

"Man, how did it end up like this?" Engineer mumbled, recalling how well things had gone for him just earlier.

* * *

Looks like everything's calm out here, Ran thought as she was flying over the Human Village.

The last of the particles had finally vanished from the morning sky. Some of the people seemed to be nervous of what had happened earlier, but from the looks of it, the feeling of uncertainty was the worst that had hit the village after the spectacle.

Ran had reached the outskirts of the village, next stop being the Hakurei Shrine, when she noticed something peculiar by the river that streamed near the village.

"What on earth is that?" Ran said out loud as she had set her eyes on a building that she didn't recall seeing the last time she visited the shrine. And that was the day before yesterday. "This must be one of the offsprings of that light show..."

Ran ceased her flight to examine the building. The structure that had appeared by the river seemed to be a wooden warehouse of some kind, painted in red and having "Happy Farmers" written on the front of the structure. The warehouse was accompanied by a bridge that had conveniently settled over the flowing river. But it seemed to be meant for a longer crossing, since the bridge had twisted on the opposing shore as it's structures had reached a bit beyond the riverbank.

Even though the warehouse seemed to be of no harm, something about it rubbed Ran the wrong way. It was one of those moments that she knew there was something off, but just couldn't put her finger on it. Maybe it was the copy-paste impression...

Guess we have to start our investigation here, Ran thought as she checked the relatively short distance between the village and the warehouse. If that spectacle brought something malicious from the outside world, we have to ensure the security of the villagers first.

Ran left the site and kept going towards the Hakurei Shrine, just a few moments before a large, blue shirted man emerged from the building, with a confused look on his face and a minigun on his shoulders.

* * *

"Look Alice, it's another one of those mystery lockers!" Marisa stated as the magicians had seemingly reached a new area within the mystery complex, a one with a spiraling tower.

The two of them had an argument on how they should've investigated the place, and with no better idea, they had decided to go with Marisa's idea of following the railroad tracks that seemed to go around the place. And even for her surprise, they actually made some progress as the tracks really did seemed to cover most of the facility's areas.

"Look, look, it's opening and closing on it's own!" Marisa said, moving back and forth in front of the locker. The puppeteer was glancing over the tower and it's surroundings through two large windows.

"You know, after seeing that for a couple of times, it isn't really that impressive", Alice noted in a dull voice, making Marisa stop her play and give her a sour face.

"Alice, you really should try and find your inner child someday. To find the joy of discovery, to find the happiness of innocence, to find..."

"Hard to to find anything from your soul when you have such a huge bag hanging on your shoulders!" Alice blurted, her tone making it apparent that she just wanted to go home. "Besides, isn't your bag already full enough?"

Even though Marisa's bag was bursting with mushrooms when they had got here, she had somehow managed to enlarge it's content by a large first-aid kit and a wooden box full of... something she recalled Nitori calling "a moe".

Hey, maybe I should have her check them out, Marisa thought as her strayed thoughts made her remember the kappa's affection towards the things from the outside world.

This just might be a good time to leave the place be. For now.

"Yeah, I think you're right", Marisa said, making Alice a bit surprised that the black-white witch actually agreed with her so easily. "Let's get going, I wanna show the things I've found to Nitori!"

A sliding door opened as Marisa approached it. She took her broom and was about to take her leave...

But as Marisa was about to exit the building, the dolls that had been dragged around suddenly tugged her back inside, making the sliding door close behind her.

"Ow! Alice, what the he..." Marisa tried to say, but one of the dolls covered her mouth. As Marisa tried to take the doll off her face, she noticed Alice at the window pointing outside, forming words with her lips with a slight panic on her face.

There... was... someone... outside, Marisa managed to make out from Alice's lip movement, making her cease her struggle.

After Alice had released Marisa, she joined the puppeteer at the window to see the stranger.

The stranger had emerged from a building to their right, from one with a huge A sign nailed on it. Apparently, the man hadn't heard the commotion just now, as he kept slowly going forward while trying to carry a bag filled with metal, by the looks of it.

The first thing that caught Marisa's attention was that she actually had to refer the stranger as a _man_.

A male? Well, that's something you don't see everyday, Marisa thought. And man, his technique of carrying sucks ass.

The second thing that had caught her attention was the stranger's clothing. The man was wearing a yellow helmet, red shirt and grayish overalls, and he was also equipped with a pair of goggles. She had occasionally seen people wearing similar clothes, but that was mostly from books and pictures from the outside world.

What was it they were called, Enchinyaa? Marisa wondered. Jeez, he's really going to get in trouble with that bag if he keeps carrying it like...

The bag suddenly slipped from the man's hands, causing the metal parts inside to spread around him. For a moment, the man seemed like he would've killed everyone in the world, given the chance, but he seem have managed to hold it back. The man slowly collected the metal fragments back to the bag, and kept going with his little journey, trying a new way to hold the bag.

Their gazes followed the man, until the stranger had finally gone in the B building.

"Now's our chance, Marisa", Alice said, "let's get out of here before that man sees..."

Alice ceased her speech as she saw the glint in Marisa's eyes

"Marisa, you said your bag was already full enough", Alice said calmly. "Whatever that man was carrying would never fit your..."

"But that man has saved me the trouble", Marisa said, making her way towards the sliding door that was nearest to the B building. "I'll be back in a moment!"

It sounded like Alice would've wanted to protest against the idea, but Marisa was already on her way towards the B building.

* * *

"Darn, that was awful", Engineer mumbled as he had finally managed to reach his room.

He's never been that good of a friend with the bags, but his little incident just now really got on his nerves. Everything had gone really well just moments earlier, so his sudden misfortune made him a bit closer to the rage he had just managed to confine earlier.

But his thoughts were soon occupied by something he had noticed while retrieving his sentry; the other side of the teleporter was nowhere to be seen around the tower. The device had flown through the window, that's for sure, but it shouldn't have really gone that far.

I'll just go get the Scout and Sniper for now, Engineer thought with a sigh. I'll search for that thing later.

He took the shotgun with him, and made his way down the stairs. He planned to go and get the Sniper first, since his room was the closest. But as he had reached one of the corridors...

"Aw, hell. Now I forgot the wrench", Engineer mumbled as he realized that his usual habit of tapping was missing it's instrument. He began reluctantly to ascend the stairs, trying to convince himself that this misfortune of his won't last long.

Stay calm Engie, stay calm, he thought, trying refrain himself from going on another rage. It's just a coincidence, nothing more, just go get your wrench and find your teammates. And then we'll go find the Spy, and give him one hell of a...

Engineer halted as he saw someone coming out of his room. It was rather interesting feeling for him to acknowledge three different things and all of them at once. One, the person looked like a witch, a one with a blonde hair and black-white clothing. Two, the witch was carrying two bags, the other he recognized to be the bag he had just used. Three, his wrench was sticking out from the bag he had just used.

The witch seemed to be having a good time, right until she made eye contact with the Engineer. Both of them had frozen to their places, with cold sweat slowly beginning to drip on the girl's face. Neither of them let out a single word, as both of them seemed to have conflicting feelings on how to react to one another.

Suddenly, the Engineer felt that something in the back of his mind had just cut the final string holding down his rage.

* * *

Red Bread. Sunny Hay. Crummy's Burgers. Could this really be just that kind of a facility, Alice wondered as she recalled the banners she had seen around the complex. She had came out of the building they had just used as their cover, but still kept an eye out in case of the man.

As the place didn't contain any "gargoyles and whatnot", Alice had unwillingly found herself wondering about the origin of the complex. The place seemed to be well-suited for such operations implied by the banners, having railroad tracks for transport, storerooms for the ingredients and all. But she just couldn't figure out why someone would've brought something like this from the outside world. And not just why, but how. She had never seen such a spectacle before, even though she knew that...

Pow! Pow!

The sounds of gunfire suddenly brought Alice back from her wonderland. She turned her head to the building with the huge B sign on it, having a hunch of what might've happened.

Pow! Pow! Pow!

"Kyaaa! Alice, help me!"

"Come back, ya rotten thief!"

Oh, for the love of...

Alice took down the bag off her shoulders and ran to the left-side entrance of the building. Marisa soon came running from the corridor, relieved to see the puppeteer arming her dolls to confront the pursuer.

"Alice, that guy just went nuts for no reason!" Marisa yelled as she ran past Alice, "Try to hold him off!"

For no reason, huh? Hard to believe that, Alice thought, giving a sigh.

"Fine, I'll take care of..." Alice said, but then she realized what the black-white witch was planning to do. "Wa... Wait! You can't just pass the bucket... like... that."

But it was too late, Marisa had already taken off with her haul.

"Come back here!" the man yelled as he ran out of the corridor, shooting blindly with his gun.

As some of the bullets were about to hit Alice, her reflexes took over, making her dodge them and dash towards the stranger. She took out one of her dolls, Shanghai to be precise, and used the doll and it's lance to pierce through the man's shotgun, wounding his hand in the process. This made the man fall on his back and cry out for his wound.

"You really should watch out where you're shooting, mister. You don't wanna get hurt, do you?" Alice said, having Shanghai floating above the man with it's lance pointed towards him.

The man seemed to have recovered from his rage, as he replied while holding his wound.

"But that... witch just stole some of my gadgets! How else I should've reacted, missy?"

As Alice was trying to think of an answer for a rather relevant question, she noticed something odd about this scene. The stranger was clearly in a great deal of pain because of his wound, why is that? It would just heal on it's own in a couple of minutes, or in a couple of seconds if one has a healing factor like Yukari Yaku...

Alice suddenly realized that there was one crucial detail she had yet to confirm.

Oh crap, don't tell me...

"Um... mister?" Alice asked nervously, "Do you... happen to be a... human?"

Out of all the questions in the world, this seemed to be one that the man never expected one to ask from another after lancing one's hand.

"Well, what the hell I _would_ be if not a human? An alien?" The man blurted out with a confused voice.

The next thing the man knew, the girl who had just been threatening him with a lance had suddenly knelt down beside him to see his wound with a panicking expression on her face.

Thank god I didn't use any Spell Cards, Alice thought as she checked the man's wound, he might have not been able to survive from one.

"Hold still for a moment", Alice said as she put her hands on the wound.

The man was still a little dumbfounded by the girl's sudden change of behavior, but he was brought back to the reality, when he realized that the burning feeling of the wound was suddenly disappearing. After a while, the girl took her hands from his wound, only to find that there was no trace of it on his skin.

"I'm so sorry for that just now", Alice said in an embarrassed voice, "I thought you were some kind of a Youkai from the outside world, I had no idea that humans would've ended up here with this whole spectacle. It has always been that when someone brings a shrine or sorts to this world, it has always been because of our kind or something, I never would've expected that humans would've been able to perform such a..."

Alice ceased her speech, as the man's expression indicated that he had lost the track of the conversation about a halfway to the first sentence.

"Whoa, whoa, hold on a little, missy", the man said, holding his head as like having a headache. "First of all, who are you? Or rather, _what_ are you?"

* * *

Man, that was scary, Marisa thought as she flew above the Forest of Magic. But I'm sure Alice can take care of that man easily, he didn't seem to be _that_ strong.

As Marisa was heading towards the Youkai Mountain, she noticed that she kept descending no matter how she tried to stay afloat. This reminded her why she had asked Alice to join her for her mushroom hunt (take a walk with her in a forest).

Aw man, it'd take hours to reach the Mountain like this, Marisa thought as she tried to stay high as possible.

"Urameshi-bleah!"

How about taking these mushrooms home... No, my house is in completely opposite direction now, I don't want to waste my time on that.

...Maybe Kourindou. Yes, I'll let Kourin take care of these while I go see Nitori, I'm sure he doesn't mind.

Setting her course towards Kourindou, Marisa still tried the best she could to stay up in the sky. Shortly after changing her course, something finally occurred to her.

Wait, did I just hit something back there? ...Meh, must've been my imagination.

* * *

Engineer was having a little hard time believing everything he was told, as the girl calling herself Alice Margatroid had just filled him in with a small trivia of this world, it's inhabitants and what she had seen earlier. He had brought the girl with him to his room, as he wanted to check out what else was missing after that... witch's visit.

The place where the facility had taken residence was apparently called Gensokyo, an isolated world inhabited by magical creatures rejected by the "outside world". And then the girl claimed to be one of those creatures, magician to be precise, and she had indeed assumed that he had been one as well.

He find the statement pretty hard to believe, as the girl looked completely like a human to him. But then again, there were these two dolls that kept floating beside her, seemingly interested about the room they and their master had been brought in.

And the... witch who had taken off with his gadgets was called Marisa, a friend of this Alice, and someone who apparently had a severe habit of "borrowing" things. But according to Alice, this Marisa was apparently a human, just like him. If she would've claimed their "species" the other way around, that would've made much more sense to him, given their clothing.

"You know, I find it a little hard to believe that all, missy. The stuff about magical monsters and worlds", Engineer said as he was going through his belongings.

"It's true", the girl replied, "and I could show you a few more trick or two, but you don't seem like one to believe it either way."

Got that right.

"I'm not that fond of the idea that people could use their minds or whatever you call them to control things beyond their limitations. It kind of goes against my studies on physics", Engineer said, while confirming that all of his wrenches had gone missing.

"That's the kind of belief that forced the creation of this world", the girl said, with bit of a sad tone.

Since the subject seemed to be a little repulsive topic around here, Engineer decided to keep the rest of his world view for himself.

But still, what was it she described as a light show, featuring huge red balls of light? It must've been caused by the teleportation, but the old man had never mentioned anything like that in his notes, Engineer thought as he recalled the blueprints of his grandfather. The ones he had used to build his current weaponry.

"Darn, looks like that girl stole my dispenser and both of my PDAs as well", Engineer said as he had confirmed what else was missing. But the list was soon enriched even more when he checked his last drawer. "And my Pistol, too? Ugh... How did it end up like this?"

As the girl saw the Engineer's agony, she let a sigh and turned her eyes to the Engineer.

"I guess there's no helping it", the girl said as she got up. "I'll help you find Marisa and retrieve your stuff, it's kind of my fault for letting her slide like that."

Engineer was a bit surprised by this offer.

"Oh, really? Well... thanks, but... You _do_ realize I can't trust you just like that, missy?" Engineer said, recalling what she had did earlier. The girl seemed to understand that.

"Well, that much is given, no doubt", Alice said. "But I believe there's not really another way for you to retrieve them. I don't think that weapons of your kind could even be enough to kill a fairy."

The way she stated it gave Engineer an impression that the fairies were amongst the weaker creatures of this world. Would've she said the same, if she had known about his sentry, he wondered. But that wasn't really enough to earn his trust.

Then he remembered that he might not have to go alone with her.

"I see... You know, that does sound like a plan, but I'd like to gather my teammates first."

"Huh? There are more of you?" Alice asked.

Something about her tone struck Engineer as odd.

"You didn't see anyone else when you came here?" Engineer asked confusedly.

"No, you were the first we encountered here", Alice said as confused. "That's odd though, I bet someone would've butt in when Marisa was checking the place out, screaming with excitement like that."

Butt in. Something that Scout mastered rather well. Once you make a contact with that kind of an individual, there's no way you could ever forget his kind of an attitude. But for this girl to say so bluntly that she hadn't seen anyone else, she must've been telling the truth. About the Scout, at least.

But that might've made sense for the Sniper as well, as he has a habit to sit by the window with a rifle in his hands. And he has a pretty neat view out of his room's window. Engineer had hard time believing that one could forget when one shoots you between the eyes.

He didn't even give a thought on Demo and Pyro, as he knew they weren't present at the facility during that... incident.

Even more worryingly still, if the girl was telling the truth, he really would have to join her to get back his equipment. Given the strikes of misfortune that had taken place now, Engineer was a bit reluctant to take on that offer. But since he didn't really have any means to defend himself, as he can't fix his shotgun without his wrench, it was a risk he had to take.

After a bit of a groaning, he finally made up his mind.

"Missy", Engineer said, bringing the girl out from the depths of her mind, "seems like we'll have to do it your way. I accept your offer, but I just have to ask you, why? Why would you help a stranger to get back _his_ stuff from _your_ friend?"

This made the girl thoughtful for a moment.

"Well, as far as I could tell, you haven't really came here to create any menace, correct?" Alice said.

"Uh, nope?" Engineer responded with a confused look. He still haven't figured how he got here in the first place.

"I think it would be justified for you to have something for your defence. There are some vicious beasts out there after all, and some of them might wanna pay a visit sooner or later. And besides", the girl knelt down on the floor while covering her face out of - for Engineer's surprise - shame, "you'd think that I'm just a weird puppeteer, if I left you with that kind of a first impression. I don't wanna be thought as a weirdo by your friends!"

A human in appearance _and_ mentality, Engineer noted. And from the looks of it, that seems to be something she has been struggling with a lot. What a strange girl.

But still, it looks like that she just wants to help him. Or she's just deceiving him.

Engineer got out of the chair and went for his pile of metal. He began to dig the pile, sticking his hands further into it. This had caught the girl's attention, as she had set her sights on him, wondering what he was doing. As the Engineer had finally found what he was looking for, he retreated his hands from the pile with a red toolbox in his hands.

As I thought, the witch didn't find it.

The box contained one of his free-time projects, a miniature version of his Sentry Gun. It still has it's flaws and he has no wrench to repair it if damaged, but it's still better than nothing.

He finally noticed the questioning look on the girl's face.

"Just something to assure myself in case of betrayal, missy", he said.

That seemed to answer her unspoken question.

"As I said, that much is given", the girl responded as she got back up. "Marisa said she wanted to show the things she had found to another friend of hers, so she's probably on her way to that mountain."

Engineer's gaze followed her finger's direction out of the window, meeting with the tall mountain in the distance.

"We'd probably be able to reach it by the afternoon, the place we're going is near the foot of the mountain."

Engineer let a sigh of relief, as he had thought that they would've had to climb it.

"Well then, missy..."

"Please, call me Alice", the girl said with a bit of an embarrassed tone.

"Okay then... Alice, I'm ready to go whenever you are", Engineer said, taking the toolbox on his shoulders.

"Okay, let me just go and get that..." Alice said, when she suddenly stopped by the room's door. She just stood there for a moment, seemingly trying to make a decision of some kind. "Or you know what, I think I'm ready to go. Which way should we go to make our exit?"

Engineer could've sworn that he saw a smug smile on her face. As for why... he thought it would be better to let it slide for now.

"Well, we could just jump down that bridge, the trees should be able to soften our landing", he said, pointing out of the window.

With their journey's start line decided, Alice opened the door and left the room with Engineer following her.

But as the two of them had reached the bridge and were about to jump...

"Oh, that's right, you haven't told me your name yet", Alice said suddenly.

This note made Engineer realize that it has been quite a while since someone had inquired his name. Among his teammates, they've just kept calling each other by their professions, so this question was quite refreshing. Even if he was a bit uncertain about the little journey ahead of them, it made a little smirk on his face.

"It's Conagher. Dell Conagher", Engineer said as they jumped among the treetops.

* * *

Chapter 2 Afterword:

Hello, this is FinnOtaku, the author of this fanfic about mad hatters and flying girls. Man, writing down a story is a bit more challenging than I had thought. I have the main points of the story pretty much figured out already, but I never would've guessed that thinking of the stuff in between would be so hard. This'll certainly be one interesting ride for me, writing this down =D

And seems like there have already been some people to check out the first chapter, over a hundred people as of now. Don't really know what to make of that yet, but I'm happy to see that some have considered it to be within their interest =)


	3. Chapter 3: Peaceful Day at Kourindou?

**東方要塞 ~ The Western Impact**

_Touhou Yousai ~ The Western Impact_

Touhou Project / Team Fortress 2 crossover fanfiction by FinnOtaku

I don't own the games that are being used as the base of this work of fiction. Touhou Project is owned by Team Shanghai Alice and Team Fortress 2 is owned by Valve.

* * *

**Chapter 3: Peaceful Day at Kourindou?**

* * *

Kourin was going over his latest artifacts, trying to decide whether to put them on display in his shop or in his stockroom in the back. This was his first pile of outside world artifacts in a while, so he was a bit delighted to have some kind of a change of pace in his usual idle days.

He glanced over his shop, checking whether there would be any good spots to put the artifacts on display. His shop was literally filled with things from the outside world, varying from clothes to weapons and from books to gadgets, and most of them brought to him by Yukari. And that also included the pile he was going over right now.

I guess I'd have to make one of those stews for her again, Kourin thought as he took some of the artifacts from the pile and tried different shelves for them.

And Tokiko was still in the corner of the room, trying to tune a guitar with a help of a book on the subject. But based on her frustrated expression, the task seemed to be a bit more than the book lover could handle.

Based on what she had told him, she was apparently requested by Mystia Lorelei to repair the instrument for her, after some of the strings had snapped in the sparrow's previous concert after an unspecified turn of events. As Tokiko didn't really know about these kind of things that much, he was a bit surprised that she had agreed to help. Most likely the sparrow had offered a discount or sort at her lamprey stand in return, wouldn't be that hard to imagine. And since Tokiko hadn't asked for his help on the matter, Kourin had just let her be.

After a good while, Kourin was pleasantly surprised that he had managed to find a good place for each of the pile's artifacts.

"Phew, that should do it", he said as he had placed the last of the artifacts on it's place. "And I'd say a snack time is in order. Tokiko, do you want anything?"

The book lover ceased her strumming and turned her attention to Kourin with a bit of a surprised expression on her face.

"Huh, me?" Tokiko said, before changing her expression to that of a thoughtful. "Hmm... Well, I guess I'd take some tea, please."

Kourin went ahead and fetched them some tea and snacks in the backroom. When he came back, he put a tray filled with snacks on his table, filled two cups with tea and handed one of them to Tokiko.

He went and sat in his chair, satisfied with his work, but as he was reaching out to his cup of tea, the front door suddenly slammed open, accompanied by an ice fairy and a blonde-haired girl.

"You, there, four eyes!" Cirno exclaimed, pointing at Kourin with an angered gaze. "Brace yourself, we're here to claim a file!"

"That is so!" Rumia concurred with her friend's statement.

Kourin decided to let his tea be, as he turned his attention to the incomers.

"I believe the correct term would be 'file a claim', oh Strongest", Kourin stated with a tone of tease, making Cirno a bit embarrassed for her verbal mistake. "So, how can I help you?"

Her determination was swiftly regained.

"Yes, we're here to clai... _file_ a claim for the bag we took", Cirno said, taking out a huge bag and placing it on Kourin's table. He recognized the bag immediately, as the two of them had barged in as suddenly earlier and taken it with them for their activities. As for what were their activities...

"Now four eyes, you see what's in this bag?" the ice fairy inquired, pushing the bag demandingly on the shopkeeper. Kourin took the bag in his hands and began to examine the content, only to find out the bag to be as empty as it was on it's departure.

"Umm, it's... empty?" Kourin stated with a questioning look, but that seemed to be the very answer the fairy was waiting for.

"Yes, why is it empty? We caught at least thousands of those orangy flakes and yet it's empty! It's obviously the bag's fault, so how are you going to make up for this loss?" Cirno exclaimed, pointing Kourin with a confident smile on her face.

Kourin replied with a prolonged sigh and a palm on his face.

"Oh, for the love of... Look, you can accuse people for the things you've bought, not for the things you've borrowed, okay? Especially if you use a certain black-white witch as a reference", Kourin said, and seems like the ice fairy got the point, based on her change of expression. After all, the two of them hadn't really asked whether he was okay with it when they took the bag.

"Oh, so it was so", Rumia suddenly said, making the ice fairy change her expression yet again and turn her head on the Youkai of the Dusk.

"Wha... You knew something like that?" Cirno said in confusion.

"Yeah, I knew."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"You looked confident, I thought you had a plan."

The blunt response made Cirno stare her friend in disbelief for a while, before turning her attention back to the shopkeeper, with her angered gaze regained. She now desperately tried to think of a good comeback line, trying to get on the top of the conversation she had initiated. But just when Kourin thought that he'd have to go over this debate for the next couple of hours...

Cirno gave a sigh.

"Well, there's no way around it then", Cirno stated, with an expression that would've hinted anyone else that _she_ had prevailed in this exchange of words. "Hey Rumia, let's go see the Human Village, I wanna see what crashed there earlier!"

"Oh, that sounds so cool! Sorry for the intrusion", Rumia said politely with a bow, before following her fairy friend out of the store. A moment of silence consumed the shop, as Kourin was too confused by the sudden conclusion of the conversation.

The silence was broken by the sound of a thud, when Tokiko put her empty cup of tea on the table. It was then Kourin realized that she had taken her time with the tea to observe the exchange of words that had just unfolded.

"Probably just one of her thinkos", Tokiko finally stated, as she have been unfortunate enough to have some experiences with the fairy's sudden change of minds.

"You don't say?" Kourin replied sarcastically, when he suddenly realized that the two of them had left the bag behind. Pleased with this turn of event, he began to fold it to put it back in his drawer.

"So Kourin, what do you think?" Tokiko asked, making Kourin turn attention to his companion again with a questioning look.

"Hm? About what?"

"You heard her. She said they collected those flakes with that bag, yet it ended up like that. I wonder what that was all about", Tokiko said with wonder in her eyes.

This made Kourin finally think on the matter. Certainly, he did find it a bit odd as the bag didn't have any holes or anything, but as he took a glance outside the window...

"Well, seeing that the ground isn't filled with them either, I guess that's how they simply were", Kourin deduced. And Tokiko seemed to find this interpretation satisfying enough, as she returned to her task and began to strum the guitar again.

Kourin put the folded bag in his drawer and finally took the cup of tea in his hands.

Looks like this'll be another peaceful day at Kourindou, Kourin thought as he took a sip of his tea.

* * *

"Reimu... My Gourd... is missing... I can't... go on... You have to... go on without me..." Suika moaned as she arduously crawled her way in the shrine's parlour. Reimu was sipping some tea as she came in.

"And good morning to you too, Suika", Reimu said, not even turning her gaze on the oni. "Your precious Gourd is just fine. Here."

Reimu waved her hand with Suika's Gourd in her hand, before placing it back on the table. This made a relieved expression on the oni's dozing face, as she slowly crawled her way to the table and placed herself in front of her Gourd. But reaching out to her source of delight seemed to be the hardest task for her, as her hands wobbled desperately around the table, trying to grasp it.

When she finally caught the Gourd in her grasp, she removed the cork and took about three bottles worth of liquor in one swallow. For starters.

"Man, that was scary. I thought I was going to die, you know", Suika said as her face began to regain it's red saturation.

"Really, Suika? You being sober would be same as the end of your life? Kind of a harsh statement there", Reimu said skeptically as she took some cookies from a basket on the table.

"Don't you go underestimating the oni's way of life!" Suika exclaimed, before taking another huge gulp of her sake, making her fall on her back with a wide drunken smile on her face.

This made Reimu give a sigh for the oni's failed attempt to act tough in her current state of being.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever you say", Reimu said, sipping some more of her tea and eating some more of her cookies.

Suddenly Reimu sensed something closing in to her shrine, something powerful enough to make her prepare herself in case of an enemy. But as the presence got closer and closer, she managed to recognize the incoming entity.

Wait, this energy... Yakumo's kitsune?

Reimu got up, leaving Suika lying on the floor as she went outside to meet the visitor. And her instinct was right, it was Ran flying towards the shrine, and it didn't take her long to reach the shrine grounds and land on the pavement.

"Glad to see you're alright, miss Hakurei", Ran said as she approached the shrine maiden with a relieved expression on her face.

"Yeah, same, I guess", Reimu said back with a bit of a questioning look. "So... What brings you here today?"

The kitsune almost lost her balance when she heard those five words, out of confusion.

"I... I beg your pardon", Ran said with a dumbfounded look on her face.

"Yeah, what brings Yukari's shikigami in my shrine all of a sudden?" Reimu asked, still with a questioning look.

Ran stared the shrine maiden with disbelief in her eyes.

"Well... That spectacle, for instance? ...This morning."

This made Reimu thoughtful for a moment, as she reviewed the events of the morning in her head.

This morning? Let's see, I woke up, made some breakfast, swept the Shrine grounds...

"Oh yeah, that. I forgot", Reimu said bluntly when she had finally found the most likely part of her memory.

This carefree response almost managed to rip the formal look off the kitsune's face.

"What do you mean you forgot?" Ran asked, trying the best she could to keep the irritation out of her voice.

"Well, that light show was impressive and all, but since nothing really came up after that, I just let it be", Reimu replied bluntly.

The second time made up for the first attempt, as it managed to heave Ran's politeness in the back of her mind.

"You're the Hakurei Shrine Maiden for the love of god! It's your responsibility to go out there and assure everyone that they are truly safe, not to sit idly waiting for an incident to simply stop by!" Ran snapped at the red-white shrine maiden.

This made Reimu back away a bit, out of surprise. Even though she knew that some weren't that fond of her way of dealing these things, hearing it from someone as usually composed as Ran...

Reimu tried to sneak herself out of the pinch.

"Uhh... well... you know, I was just waiting for something to happen first, before sticking my head impolitely in the affairs of other peop..."

But the attempt seemed to be most unsuccessful.

"I'm telling you, that's _not_ the way you shrine maidens are supposed to handle these things! You're supposed to be the one to make sure nothing _will_ happen!" Ran snapped again.

Reimu finally decided to stand up for herself on the matter.

"So, what, I'm supposed to go around lurking in other people's houses like Yukari? Is that how you want it?"

"No! Definitely not like that old ha...!" Ran suddenly covered her mouth, when she realized how she was getting too carried away with her feelings.

The sudden outburst made Reimu stare the kitsune in awe. Even though she knew that some weren't that fond of Yukari's way of dealing things, and most of them rather unwilling to point it out, hearing it from her shikigami...

And just when Reimu thought she was lucky that her master wasn't around to hear it, a purple gap suddenly appeared behind Ran, making both of them flinch by the sound it made. The poor kitsune slowly began to turn her gaze behind her, as the slight symptoms of panic began to spread on her face.

"Yu-Yukari-sama! Ho-How long have you been the... Kya!" Ran ceased her talk, when Yukari suddenly grabbed her collar with an angered gaze. But just when the panic began to rapidly take over the rest of her body...

"Ran, what the hell happened here while I was asleep? The border is a complete mess up there!" Yukari yelled at her shikigami, pointing up in the bright morning sky.

"...Huh?" Ran managed to say, as this was not what she had anticipated from her master, since she had almost called her master... that.

"Don't 'huh' me, you idiot!" Yukari kept going with an astonished tone. "You let your sleeping master lie with the border in that kind of condition? Who was it? Kazami? Scarlet Devil? Someone else?"

It took Ran quite a while to shove off her initial feelings of fear and somewhat tune herself in the conversation.

"Uhh... Well, where should I begin?"

* * *

"Aaargh! How can this be so frustrating?" Tokiko finally let out her frustration, making Kourin choke a bit by his tea with the sudden outburst. "Just when I think I get one right, other one sounds all off! How can people stand these things?"

As Kourin had finished coughing up, he thought this would be a good chance to inquire her why she was so determined to tune the thing.

"If it's so frustrating, why not just give it back to Lorelei and tell her you don't know how to tune it properly?" Kourin asked, wiping some of the tea that had spilled on the table. The question made Tokiko give him an astonished look in return.

"Mysti promised me three free meals if I manage to tune this thing by her next concert. Three free meals!" Tokiko exclaimed, emphasizing the three by sticking out an equal amount of fingers with her free hand.

Figures, Kourin thought. Even though he knew that Mystia's food has been rather popular lately, this seemed to be a bit...

"I see..." Kourin said as the book lover began to strum the guitar again, with the frustration written all over her face now. But as Kourin was reaching out to his cup of tea, the front door suddenly slammed open again, this time accompanied by a sweaty black-white witch.

"I made it! I made it without crashing on any of the trees!" Marisa exclaimed as she rushed in.

"Marisa? Now what have happened to you?" Kourin asked when he saw her hazy gaze and wobbly posture, a rather rare combination for this usually healthy girl.

"Kourin, hold on to these for me, will ya? I have some things to do at the Youkai Mountain", Marisa said as she laid a bag full of mushrooms on the floor.

"Huh? Marisa, just what are you...? He-Hey! That's mine!" Kourin exclaimed as the black-white witch snatched his cup of tea and swiftly emptied it's remaining content. Along with a handful of cookies, this seemed to make her regain some of her stamina as her posture became more stable.

"Phew, that hit the spot", Marisa said as she put the cup back on the table. "Well then, I'll be taking my leave now, see ya."

"Explain yourself!" Kourin yelled as he stood up and went after her out of the store. But Marisa was already speeding towards the mountain when he had managed to get outside.

"Geez, I just don't understand that girl sometimes", Kourin mumbled, "barging in like that asking favors like she's some kind of king of the... Huh? Wait a minute..."

Although Marisa's figure became smaller and smaller, Kourin managed to make out a shape of another bag on the witch's shoulders.

"Didn't she just bring one... Wait, did she tried to fly with two bags?" Kourin wondered out loud, knowing that she wasn't powerful enough to perform such a feat that fluently. "Now what on earth could've made her try a stunt... like... that?"

His eyes came across something peculiar lying on the ground, something that looked like to be made out of metal. As he took the thing in his hands for a closer inspection, he came to the conclusion that the artifact was a wrench. Odd in appearance though, as it was equipped with a spiked knuckle guard and a sharpened metal piece on the top. And since he hadn't seen the artifact before, he had a pretty good guess on where it might have came from.

"Marisa, just who did you robbed this time?" Kourin mumbled as he went back in his store with the wrench in his hand.

* * *

"Just what is going on here?" Spy let out his confusion as he was checking out his current location. He was desperately trying to find any sign of life - be it BLU or even RED - after his sudden transportation to the desert facility of Dustbowl.

He remembered that he was in the Thunder Mountain facility, exchanging unexpectedly equal blows with the Engineer, when an impact had suddenly came out of thin air, made him fly off the bridge and black out.

But when he had finally came back to his senses, he had found himself on a circular metallic platform, making him confused at first as he knew that these kind of artifacts - Control Points, if you may - haven't been built in the Thunder Mountain facility.

It was after a few moments of inspection when he finally recognized his surroundings. Or at least, part of them.

The first thing that had caught his attention was a huge red silo, connected by a pipe to a building to the Spy's left. The building connected to the silo was labeled with "Jenkin Coal Co.", finally placing him somewhere else, since he knew that that company didn't have any activity in the Mountains. As for where he was now, the final hint for him was the top of a rocket visible in the distance, placing himself in the "abandoned" mining facility of Dustbowl.

Or that's what he thought, until he took a glance behind him, scrambling all of his assumptions on his current location again. Behind the metal fence that should have contained the sight of seemingly endless piles of sand was replaced with trees as far as his eyes could see, with mountains far in the distance. As he went and took a closer look of the sight behind the fence, he noticed the awkward border of sand and grass, as if someone had cut the facility out of the desert and put it randomly in the middle of a forest. Though reluctant to believe it, but with the yellow-orange particles floating down from the sky, that was the interpretation he had to hang on to for the time being.

As he decided to cautiously make his way to the location of the rocket, he got a better chance to observe the change of scenery around the place.

By the appearance, your average person could easily disregard the place as a simple mining factory, but just like an average Mann facility, there's a whole lot more than what meets the eye. While it's officially stated that the facility is no longer in use, one of the Mann twins - Redmond - has been using the place as his personal playground, trying to butt in between the United States and the Soviet Union in their Space Race with his own contribution. And since the place has been so dear for his free time, his brother - Blutarch - have constantly tried to take it over with his team of mercenaries. Unsuccessfully, so far.

And as the Spy slowly made his way to the center of this place, it became apparent to him that an awkward cut and paste act really seemed to have taken place in the facility. Power lines leading beyond the sand-grass border had been cut off, along with a train track that led to the facility. It might have been an interesting sight to see what could have happened, if there had been some wagons present during the transportation. Would've they been cut in half or brought in whole was the Spy's approximate train of thought on the matter.

And as he had finally reached the location of the rocket and the control rooms beside it, it was as he had anticipated after seeing the power lines. The lights didn't turn on and the communications didn't work either. And to his worry, none of his teammates seemed to have ended up here either, but to his relief, neither have anyone from the opposing team.

"Merde... If this is how it's going to be, I can't stay here for long", Spy thought out loud, checking out one of the two control rooms. "I need to find out what's beyond that fence and get some sense in this. And maybe..."

He couldn't help but wonder about the fate of his teammates. Did they end up here, too? Or is he the only one? And could the RED team be here as well?

Even though this might have been his chance of a life-time to raid the place, his list of priorities forced him to grab only the necessities. With a help of his flashlight, he fetched himself some additional ammo and a couple of smaller health packs from one of the lockers. Surprisingly enough, the locker still seemed to open and close on it's own even without electricity, making it rather difficult for him to claim what he needed in that kind of a lightning.

When he had finally finished his preparations to explore beyond the facility, he stepped out of the control room and took out his Disguise Kit. Not for a disguise, but a smoke. As his PDA was built to look like a cigarette case, he thought it would be disrespectful to not use it as one, being a rather frequent smoker and all. After taking out one of his cigarettes, he put the case back in his pocket and put a fire on the smoke as he sat down.

As he slowly took his time with the tobacco, he tried to evaluate the best direction in which he should proceed for now. But after he had gone through all the things he had seen beyond the metal fence so far, the poll was rather short-lived.

After he finished the smoke, he got up and began to make his way out of the facility. Out of all things he had seen so far, one had stroke him as particularly odd. He had caught a glimpse of it when he was glancing over the cut-off power lines. A glimpse of a huge, red mansion by a lake.

* * *

In a world like Gensokyo, one can roughly put youkai in two different kind of groups. There are those who act like people, play with people, but are nearly as weak as one. And then there are those who detest people, kill people, and posses a ridiculous strength.

But there are also this rare minority that goes right in-between the two, and among the humans and the weaker youkai, one individual tends to be considered as a prime example of this group rather frequently.

"Kick. Punch. It's all in the mind", Meiling mumbled as she was going over her daily training routine in front of the Scarlet Devil Mansion's gate.

Even with a monstrous durability and a severe lack of weak spots, this girl has remained unusually humble with her unusually humane manners. Known for her mastery on the martial arts, she is also rather well-known for her good relationship with the humans and the weaker youkai, even being generous enough to help those who wish to get stronger.

But more than anything, she is known as the Gatekeeper of the Scarlet Devil Mansion, fending off those who try to intrude without a proper invitation. Though it is told that if one does not attempt to proceed through the gate, she would be more than happy to take on people's challenges. Whether this is true or not is only known by those who have been brave enough to get so close to the Scarlet Devil's Den.

"Kick away those clinging chronic diseases. Say farewell to the... Oh, Sakuya, welcome back!" Meiling suddenly noticed the Chief Maid walking down the forest path, making her cease her training session. "How was your trip to the Village?"

"Well, you know, the usual", Sakuya replied as she got to the gatekeeper, with a shopping bag in her hands. "Anything happened while I was gone?"

The question made Meiling give a bit of a wistful sigh.

"Not really, no one has really tried to intrude here lately for some reason. Even that black-white one hasn't paid a visit these last couple of days", Meiling said with a bit of a frown.

"Eeh, is that so?" Sakuya replied. But instead of going through the gate as she usually would after a little small talk, she just kept standing there, seemingly waiting for something. "And?"

"And?" Meiling replied with a questioning look. And it was then she noticed the knife the maid had been waving between her fingers, making her flinch a bit.

"Anything **else** you want to tell me?" Sakuya asked, making it clear that she won't be taking no for an answer.

Whuuuh? What is this, why is she angry? I wasn't even sleeping on duty now, I was doing my training... Ah! Could it be... Yes, it has to be!

"Sorry! It was me!" Meiling exclaimed with an apologizing tone, changing the maid's expression to that of confusion. "It was me who ate that pudding in the fridge, I didn't know it was yours!"

"So it was you!" Sakuya exclaimed, but realized that her speech was nowhere near as planned. "No, I mean... That! What is that thing among the woods?"

"Huh?" Meiling sounded. The maid was pointing towards the complex of buildings that had appeared near the Scarlet Devil Mansion. This made the gatekeeper laugh a bit when she finally realized the source of the maid's anger.

"Oh, you meant _that_ thing. Sorry, my bad, I forgot that you weren't around when that thing came crashing down from the sky", Meiling said with a bit of a laughter, swiftly replied with a knife in the head.

"I was worried sick about whether the mansion was safe or not!" Sakuya yelled with a flustered expression on her face. "That light show almost gave me a heart attack!"

Meiling clumsily got back up and tugged the knife out of her forehead.

"Well, I assure you that I haven't let anyone pass here today nor have I seen anyone suspicious around here", Meiling said as she put the knife in the shopping bag. The wound on her forehead was already beginning to heal.

"Assuming you've been awake this whole time", Sakuya said with a sarcastic tone, before turning her gaze on the complex again. "And? You've made sure that there's no one in there?"

The question brought a surprised expression on Meiling's face, but soon followed by a mischievous grin.

"Whatever might the Chief Maid be talking about? My primary objective is to guard the front gate of the Scarlet Devil Mansion unless otherwise ordered, you know", Meiling replied with a tone of tease. Her wound on the forehead had already disappeared.

Sakuya was urging to take her knife out of the shopping bag, but she had to admit that Meiling actually had a valid point there.

"Ugh... Fine", Sakuya said as she composed herself and got more serious. "Meiling, go check out that place and see if you can find anything suspicious in there. And if you find any strange individuals, bring them over, they might know what all this spectacle was abou...**?**"

"You're so cute when you try to be serious", Meiling said as she was petting Sakuya's head with an euphoric expression on her face. The act made Sakuya flustered, urging her to take out her knife from the shopping bag again. But just as she had put her hand in the bag and was about to take the knife in her grip...

"Jeez, Meiling! I'm not a kid anymore, stop treating me like this!" Sakuya exclaimed as she tried to cover her mixed feelings of embarrassment and delight by stuffing her face on Meiling's chest.

"Not a chance", Meiling said teasingly, before turning her tone more gentle, "because no matter how much time will pass, I'll always think you as the little Sakuya-chan."

The petting went on for another moment or two, until Meiling finally let go and began to make her way to the woods.

"I'll be back in a jiff, try to find some fairy maids to look over for my spot!" Meiling yelled as she vanished in the woods.

"Y-Yes..." Sakuya mumbled, still smiling like a little child after the petting maneuver that had just taken place. But when she took a look at the mansion, she noticed two of the fairy maids looking out of one of the windows, both having smug grins on their faces. But the two of them quickly got themselves out of sight when they noticed the Chief Maid's gaze.

Realizing how embarrassing her moment with Meiling must have looked like, Sakuya tried to cover her face as best as she could as she dashed through the courtyard back to the mansion.

* * *

"So... A gap opened in the sky, shooting down balls of light... and you think each of these balls brought some buildings from the outside world?" Yukari asked, seemingly trying to assure herself that she got it right.

"That sounds about right", Ran stated, but something about the way her master had been listening to her story made her feel a bit uncertain. The way her master was giving her dubious looks, for instance.

"...Ran, are you feeling alright?" Yukari asked as she put her hand on the kitsune's forehead, as if checking her temperature. This act made Ran a bit embarrassed, but mostly mad for her master's lack of confidence in her.

"It's true, master! It even had that overwhelming feeling of presence before they came crashing down! Why would I lie to you about something like that?" Ran exclaimed, shoving off Yukari's hand.

"Reimu, is she telling the truth?" Yukari asked the shrine maiden, seemingly ignoring the kitsune's assurance.

"Huh?" Reimu first said, when she was suddenly required to reply. "Oh, well... I'm not sure about that latter part, but I saw them too. The balls of light."

But this still didn't seem to assure Yukari enough, as her expression turned even more doubtful.

"Riiiiight..."

"Oh, come on! Why is it so hard for you to believe that, Yukari-sama?" Ran asked with a frustrated tone.

"Well, it just doesn't feel like something as major as that had taken place here", Yukari stated as she looked around.

Oh, you gotta be kidding me...

"Yukari-sama, with all due respect, doubting me because how you feel is a little..."

Feel.

The thing that was bugging her about the warehouse by the river. The thing why no one seemed to be that worried about the spectacle. The thing why her master didn't trust her on the matter. Ran finally realized what was missing in the morning's event.

To bring things like buildings from the outside world, one usually needs really powerful magic, and even with that, the transportation takes almost as equal amount of preparations. And more than anything, these events always leave behind traces of magical outburst both in the site of departure and the site of arrival. In the past, these outbursts have easily caused a week-long mass-paranoia among the Gensokyo's residents, due to the magical susceptibility.

And yet, the morning's spectacle lacked this overwhelming presence altogether, making it feel like any other day of this world. One could say it's a good thing, but for Ran the situation got a lot more serious. To cause a transportation of that scale without magic...

Just what are we up against here?

"...Ran, are you sure you're feeling alright?" Yukari said, putting her hand on the kitsune's forehead again.

"Huh? Oh... Well, you know... S-So, how are we going to deal with this situation, Yukari-sama?" Ran said, shoving off her master's hand again while trying to sound a bit more serious. Even though her attempt to change the topic sounded far from successful, Yukari decided to go along.

"Well, since the border _is_ in really bad shape up there, I'm afraid I have to deal with that first", Yukari said, pointing up in the sky. "I might be done with it by the nightfall, but until then", Yukari put her hand on Ran's shoulder, "you're in charge of the investigation."

"...HUUUH?"

* * *

Chapter 3 Afterword:

Hello, this is FinnOtaku, the author of this crossover fanfiction. Kind of a ridiculous gap between this and the Chapter 2, I'm not sure if these kind of gaps are a normal thing around here. But if they aren't, I'm sorry... ^^;

Since I'm planning to have multiple storylines being told at the same time, I've been having some problems on what bits of which character's story will be told and in which order. And... I think this would be a good time to say this: There most likely _will_ be more of these ridiculous gaps between the release of chapters, so you just have to be patient with this. Haste makes waste and all that =(

Oh, and as a reply for one of the reviews on Chapter 2: **All** of the 9 main characters from the TF2 world were brought over to Gensokyo in this incident, even Demo and Pyro. But as for how did that happened... Stay tuned =P

...And yes, I _am_ planning to have Demo meet Suika at some point.


	4. Chapter 4: What's in the box?

**東方要塞 ~ The Western Impact**

_Touhou Yousai ~ The Western Impact_

Touhou Project / Team Fortress 2 crossover fanfiction by FinnOtaku

I don't own the games that are being used as the base of this work of fiction. Touhou Project is owned by Team Shanghai Alice and Team Fortress 2 is owned by Valve.

* * *

**Chapter 4: What's in the box?**

* * *

Crap, this ain't good, Scout thought as he tried to keep himself out of sight with a couple of crates.

"Wahahahaaa! That's right, hide you coward! I will find you!" BLU Heavy yelled as he was shooting around with his Minigun, trying to make Scout reveal his location.

Scout was just about to reach his room after his visit to Engineer's den, when he had ran into some familiar faces from his earlier confrontation today. And with nothing but an empty shotgun and an angry Russian having some bones to pick with him, he had no choice but to make a run for it.

Ugh... This is just like back at the frickin' Basin, Scout thought as he felt some of Heavy's bullets sweeping across the crates he was using as his cover.

Scout's gaze reluctantly met with his only weapon at hand, trying to make up his mind whether he'll repeat the emergency bat sequence and just accept one of Engineer's chores afterwards.

Dammit, there's no way around this, Scout made up his mind, taking a good grip of his shotgun's barrel. 'Kay, as soon as that guy runs out of bullets, I'll smack his head in.

The sound of the Russian's laughter got slowly closer and closer, right behind the Scout's hiding spot, when...

_Click__! __Click__! __Click__! __Click__!_

Now!

But just when Scout was about to leap out to confront the Heavy-Medic combo, ready to try his luck...

BO-

* * *

"Bleaaah... That dummy black-white witch..." Kogasa moaned as she tried to find her way out of the woods, leaning on the umbrella to maintain her balance. "She just crashed on me like that, it's not fair! She didn't even looked at me!"

Kogasa's attempt to surprise Marisa ended up being rather unsuccessful, as the black-white witch didn't even seem to notice her when she had jumped on the witch's path. The tip of broom hit right on her face, sending her straight down among the treetops, hitting her head on a branch, slowly dropping on her stomach on another branch, and finally dropping head first on a rock.

"Uwaaa... I'll just try to find a way out of here for now", Kogasa told herself with bit of a teary eyes. And after her long search, she finally caught a glimpse of one of mankind's greatest achievements in traveling. Or in other words, a road.

But as she got closer to the edge of the woods, she began to pick up bits of conversation further down the road, a one between a male and a female by the sound of it. Instinctively, she hid herself behind one of the trees.

And as the voices got louder, Kogasa recognized the voice of the feminine representative.

Huh? Isn't this... That weird puppeteer? What's she doing all the way out here?

"Are you sure there isn't some logical explanation behind something like that?" Kogasa heard the other voice, the one of male's.

And who's this guy? That's definitely not Kourin...

"Something like liquid hydrogen, or..."

"It's her power! Geez, why can't you just believe it, mister Dell?"

"Oh, sorry, but... This Cirno girl just sounds like that kind of a fellow who would attempt dumb stunts without second thoughts."

"...No argument there."

Kogasa concurred with a quiet nod.

Kogasa caught a glimpse of Alice and her mystery companion as they walked past her hiding spot. The man with the puppeteer was wearing rather odd clothes, and carrying some kind of a red box on his shoulders.

Could he be an outsider? Did he came here along with those lights?

Kogasa heard Alice let a sigh.

"I think you should just see it for yourself sometime. You really are kind of a man who believes his own eyes rather than others..."

"Kind of a necessity for my job, more or less. And I still don't quite believe you about this whole youkai-monster business, miss Alice."

"Uugh... Well, just don't say I didn't warn you when we run into some more ferocious examples... By the way, what's hydrogen?"

By this time Kogasa was already deep in thought, intrigued by the man with the box.

Who is he? Where did he come from? What's in the box? What's with his clothes? Where are they going? What's in the box? Why is the puppeteer with him? Why is he with the puppeteer? What's in the box? What's in the box? What's in the...

"I wanna see what's in the box!" Kogasa let out her thoughts, now showing little to no signs of her earlier beat-down. Luckily there was enough distance between her and the two that her outburst went seemingly unheard.

Slowly, Kogasa began to quietly follow them among the woods, with a curious glint in her eyes.

* * *

"Oi, Kyouko! ...Oooi, Kyouko-chan, rise and shine!"

Uuuhm... Mysti?

Kyouko got up as her dozing glance wobbled around the room, trying to catch a glimpse of her feathered friend. But even when she did, her attempt to greet her only ended up as a gesture to cover her yawn.

"Huaaaaah... Mornin' Mysti", Kyouko mumbled, trying the best she could to not fall over on the futon. "What are you doing in our temple this early in the morning?"

This made Mystia let out a bit of a sigh.

"Well the last time I checked, my stand was not part of your place, sleepyhead."

The reclamation made Kyouko finally take notice of her current surroundings, ones she did not relate to the Myouren temple. She noticed the grill behind Mystia, and the cupboards next to her futon, placing herself in Mystia's house. And as she noticed some sheet music scattered on the floor, she began to remember how the two of them were on quite a writing mood last night, and - by the looks of it - she never got the strength to walk back home after that.

"And I'm not sure if you could call this early in the morning, it's nearly 10 o'clock already", Mystia kept going while arranging some of her stocks.

Still half-asleep, Kyouko's brains slowly began to compare the given time of day to her today's schedule at the temple. She recalled that Ichirin had asked her to help with the breakfast around 8 o'clock, so that gives her about two hours to... hours to... to...**!**

"Aaah!" Kyouko shouted out and stood up in panic, when she finally managed to align her facts straight. She grabbed her clothes lying on the cupboard next to her, and began to desperately put them on.

"I promised to help Ichirin with the breakfast this morning! I need to go back to the temple right awa..."

"Now hold it right there!" Mystia said, grabbing Kyouko's shoulder and - by that - the yamabiko's attention. "No one is going anywhere without a proper meal on my watch!"

Even though this sudden offer did sounded appetizing, Kyouko's gaze still went back to the door.

"But, Ichirin..."

"Rushing into things with an empty stomach would just make you feel worse, Kyouko-chan", Mystia tried to comfort her friend with a calm tone. "I'm sure she's willing to forgive you, so calm down, I'll make an omelette for you."

The yamabiko was now being torn up inside by these two choices, her gaze going back and forth desperately between Mystia and the door. But just as her mind was beginning to lean on her initial plan...

_Grooooowl__..._

Kyouko ceased her panic-like behavior and slowly turned her gaze down on her stomach, which let out another loud growl. When she finally began to calm down, her legs suddenly gave way and she fell down on the floor, bringing the insidious feeling of hunger finally to her full attention.

"Two eggs?" Mystia asked as she took her hand off the yamabiko's shoulder.

"Two eggs..." Kyouko replied as she slowly crawled her way to the other side of the grill.

* * *

"Well then, I shall be taking my leave now", Yukari said, giving one last look on her shikigami. "I'm counting on you on this, Ran."

"Ye... Yes, master..." Ran mumbled.

After the sudden giveaway of responsibility, Ran had insisted to make sure whether she was truly qualified enough to lead this kind of an investigation by herself. But after a reassurance after reassurance, the thing that finally made her accept the task was Yukari's suggestion to swap it with her's. And border maintenance sure ain't an easy job.

"I'll be seeing you, then", Yukari said, about to take her leave... "Oh, and Ran."

"Hm? What is it, Yukari-sa-**!**" Ran was about to ask, until she saw the look on her master's face.

"If you do well enough, I might just forget about your little **mishap** back there", Yukari added, before vanishing into thin air with her gap.

So she _did_ hear it, Ran thought to herself, trying to not think of the possible list of all the penalties her master has in store for her.

"Poor Chen... To lose her master in such a miserable way..." Reimu said, putting her hand on the kitsune's shoulder. Ran didn't even have to take a look on the maiden's face to feel her mocking intent.

"She's _not_ going to kill me for that!" Ran snapped, shoving off the shrine maiden's hand. "And you better be ready to take off, 'cause we got some work to do!"

This made turn Reimu's expression to that of reluctant, as she tried to avoid the kitsune's gaze.

"Don't you give me that look, you heard her, whatever was brought here managed to rip the border up pretty badly! Even the Moriya Shrine didn't manage to do _that_ much damage, Yukari managed to fix those damages within an hour!"

The reasoning seemed to hit it's designated target, as Reimu's face seemed to indicate that she had no reason to leave the situation now as it is. And after a bit more of her futile eye-contact avoidance, Reimu finally let out a sigh of her mental defeat.

"Fine then", Reimu said, turning her eyes on the kitsune, still with a slight annoyance on her face. "So, any ideas how we're gonna do this then, miss Main Investigator?"

Even though Ran hadn't really thought on the following course of action as she was more prepared to keep persuading the maiden, the question made her quickly recap what she could remember from the earlier spectacle. Once she was done with that, she turned to the maiden to fill the possible gaps.

"Miss Reimu, from your point of view, how many of those lights did you see, and where did they landed?"

"Huh?" Reimu sounded, a bit surprised by the kitsune's sudden change of expression. "Oh, well... I don't really remember how many there were all in all, but I'm pretty certain that couple of them hit near the Village, the Forest and Remilia's place. And... I'm not sure, there might've been one that ended up somewhere in the Bamboo Forest and another one that hit near the foot of the Youkai Mountain. Those are the only ones I can remember, really."

"I see..." Ran replied, with a thoughtful expression on her face. "From my point of view, I'm most certain that one of them did hit near the Youkai Mountain, and I did see one of them flying towards the Bamboo Forest as well. And I believe there was another one, and it headed towards that new temple."

"A new temple? You mean the Myouren one?"

"Yes. So for now, that makes about six of them..."

Based on the information at hand, Ran now began to plan on the most efficient way to secure all of these crash sites in the shortest period of time. But for a mathematical genius like her, it didn't take her long to go through all of the possible scenarios and pick out the one she thought was the best for them.

"...Miss Hakurei, let me handle the ones near the Village, you go investigate the crash sites beyond the Forest of Magic", Ran finally said, pointing to the general direction of the Forest, with the Scarlet Devil Mansion and Youkai Mountain being beyond it.

"Huh?" Reimu asked, not seemingly following the kitsune's train of thought. "Why there? Shouldn't I go take care of the ones near the Village? You know, to make people feel safe."

"It would be better that way, your presence there would just make people unnecessarily upset."

Now Reimu was completely lost on where Ran was getting at.

"Wh... What do you mean upset?! I'm the Hakurei Shrine Maiden, why would they be upset seeing me doing my job?"

Ran turned her face to the shrine maiden with a serious gaze.

"That's just it. With your tendency to resolve incidents only when requested or when your shrine is involved, which - may I add - is not that often", the remark made Reimu grunt a bit, "your average human most likely see you as _the_ one who's brought up when the things take turn for the worst. And if people hear that you've been investigating the mysterious buildings near the Village, they would immediately assume that something bad has happened. What I could see on my way here, that's not the case as of yet, so it's better not to make people feel too uneasy."

The argument seemed to be reasonable enough, based on the shrine maiden's frustrated, yet understanding expression. It is true that whenever she has business to do at the Village and such, some people tend to give her dubious looks, whispering among themselves whether the miko's presence is a sign of a new upcoming incident. Which isn't really the most ideal presumption for people to have, given her occupation and primary source of income.

But after a while, Reimu finally realized something, taking a dubious look on the kitsune. But as she was about to speak up her mind...

"As for myself", Ran interrupted, "even though I _am _Yukari's shikigami, I'm quite a frequent visitor at the Village. Most of the people probably just thinks of me as another human-friendly youkai, so even if someone did see me at a crash site, they'd most likely just disregard it as your average youkai's curiosity."

And that seemed to answer the shrine maiden's unspoken question.

"And since I tend to hang out with the youkai a lot, they wouldn't find it as strange if they see me going take a look at these crash sites as opposed to you, correct?" Reimu deduced, based on the kitsune's apparent logic.

"That's pretty much the gist of it", Ran concluded. "Well then, now that it's settled, let's get to work, shall we?"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it, I get it", Reimu said as she went back to her shrine to get her gohei lying on the parlour's floor. "So, what'll we do if we find encounter anything strange from these places we're heading?"

The question made Ran give the miko a bit surprised look.

"Rather an odd question from a 'shoot-first' person like you, but appropriate", Ran said as the two of them were taking some distance from the shrine. "Let's see now... If you do find someone or something threatening that can't be reasoned with, just immobilize them for now, we'll ask the questions later."

"So basically just like any other incident, then... Well, anything else?" Reimu asked, as they both were now gathering some powers to take off.

"No, that would be all. Good luck out there, miss Hakurei", Ran said as she lifted herself off the ground.

"Right back at you, you kitsune", Reimu replied, and with that note, the two of them blasted off to their respective areas of interest.

But not long after they had left, something that Reimu had forgotten under her kotatsu began to call out for her, with a slightly intoxicated tone of voice.

"Reimu...? Where you at...?"

* * *

"Are you sure you're talking about the same fellow here?" Engineer asked as the puppeteer had shared him another piece of interesting trivia. "I mean, caring for flowers and murderous intent doesn't really sound like a common pair of traits if ya ask me."

"I'd love to say it's only speculation", Alice replied, "but those who have stumbled in her garden have found traces of human bones and such at times."

The current topic: Yuuka Kazami and her lovely sunflowers.

"Well, uuh... I _have_ heard that corpses make a good fertilizer, but that sounds a bit..."

"Aah... But thank God for the Spell Cards", Alice said, letting a bit of a relieved sigh. "If I ever end up in her way, I might even stand a chance against her."

Suddenly Engineer stopped his walking, with an intrigued look on his face.

"Hm? What's wrong, mister Dell? Need to take a break?"

"These Spell Cards..." Engineer said, rubbing his chin with his free hand. "You've mentioned them quite a few times now. What are they, exactly?"

Based on the puppeteer's expression, it was only then that she realized that she had ignored a rather significant detail in her briefing.

"Oh, yeah, I forgot about them", Alice said, taking out what appeared to be piece of paper out of her pocket and giving it to the Engineer to have a look. "Spell Cards are our way to settle things so that even the weakest youkai could stand a chance in a battle against the stronger ones. Even though they were first made to help resolve incidents, most youkai have been using them more for fun lately."

"Hmm... Well ain't that an intriguing tale..." Engineer muttered, examining the piece of paper in his hand. "So... How does it work?"

But as the puppeteer was about to reply, her expression suddenly went from know-it-all to uncertain. And after a few moments of observation, Engineer came to the conclusion that this was her first time trying to actually explain the principles behind these strange artifacts.

"Well... It's kind of like..." Alice began, taking her card back from Engineer. "There are these writings on a paper..."

An awkward silence fell between the two, and an embarrassed blush began to slowly spread around the puppeteer's face. Though it is given that there are such things as tacit knowledge, this question seemed to catch the puppeteer completely off-guard.

"Yeah, I can see that", Engineer replied, trying to break the silence as gently as possible. With little to no success.

The puppeteer was now pitch red out of embarrassment, but after a moment or two, she tried to redeem herself.

"N-No, it's not like that... Wait, I mean, it _is_ like that, but... Th-There's just like much more to that than just some scribbles on a paper! It's more like, more like... Huh?"

Alice's eyes suddenly ceased their merry-go-round, and were locked on something behind Engineer. And whatever it was, it made her expression turn from flustered to that of annoyance.

"Uugh... Just when I'm actually busy for once..." Alice muttered as Engineer began to turn around to see what had caught the puppeteer's attention.

His gaze was met by a one-eyed eggplant colored umbrella.

"Aah!" Engineer wailed as he fell over with his toolbox, out of surprise.

The strange folded umbrella was sticking out of one of the bushes bordering the road. The umbrella had a big red eyeball, accompanied by a huge tongue sticking below it. By a quick glance, the latter's organic or non-organic nature might make a really good topic for a debate.

But before Engineer had even finished his observation on this unusual sight...

"You'll never be able to master the art of hide-and-seek if you keep standing out like that!" Alice yelled. "Get out of there!"

It took a while, but the umbrella slowly began move towards the road, and it didn't take long for a head of a turquoise haired girl to pop out of the bush.

After this girl had finally got out of the bush and slowly stood up, it gave Engineer a good glance of the mysterious umbrella's supposed owner. The girl's clothes were pretty much same toned as her hair, varying in different shades of blue. Though one thing that stood out more were the colors of the girl's eyes, one of red and one of blue. And after his glance of the girl's looks, he finally took note of the girl's expression.

She was snickering.

"Pfft... 'Writings on a paper'", the girl imitated Alice's voice, making the puppeteer blush again.

Well, can't really blame her for that, Engineer thought, being a bit amused himself.

But when Engineer noticed the dolls slowly arming themselves, something in the back of his mind was yelling at him that he should try to change the subject. Immediately.

"S-So, who would you be then, little missy?" Engineer blurted the first thing he could think of as he got back up, trying to make the puppeteer snap out of her embarrassment.

"Hm?" the girl sounded, ceasing her compressed laughter and turning her attention to the Engineer. And oddly enough to Engineer, the girl's change of expression had a strange resemblance to that of the Scout, at moments when he's about to brag how "superior" he is.

"Fufufuu... Behold, you mere foreign mortal! You are in the presence of the all-mighty, all-powerful, all-knowinginly, Kogasa-chan!"

...Not that she'd be as good, apparently.

As an awkward silence fell among them yet again, Engineer couldn't help but feel a really strong sense of déjà vu. Though as apparent as it seemed, he couldn't help but wonder whether it really was just because of the silence, or because of the strange pose the girl had managed to hold for more than five seconds. But after a quick evaluation of these two possibilities, he eventually settled with the silence.

"...So, who is she?" Engineer asked Alice, back from her chamber of embarrassment.

"Kogasa Tatara. Self-proclaimed pro prankster and the local antique shop's freeloader", Alice retorted, clearly wanting to get even with the girl.

And seems like it was a bullseye.

"H-Hey! What do you mean 'freeloader'?!"

"Well, that's what Marisa's been calling you, has she not?"

"I help him out with his shop, how does that make me a freeloader, you weird puppeteer?!"

"Wha...! W-Who're you calling weird?!"

"Uuh... Pardon me, little miss", Engineer interrupted the two's heating debate, facing the umbrella girl, "but we're a little busy at the moment, so if you don't mind, we'd just take our leave to the..."

"Ah! The box!" the girl suddenly exclaimed, pointing towards the Engineer with an excited look on her face.

It might've been because of the mood just a moment ago, but it took Engineer quite a long time to finally register the change of this umbrella girl's expression. And as he finally began to understand the meaning behind the girl's words, his gaze eventually turned to the closest thing that resembled the artifact in question.

"...The box?" Engineer said, tapping on the toolbox on his shoulders. The umbrella girl replied with an enthusiastic nod. This enthusiasm made Engineer a bit uneasy, making him take a few steps back. "...What about it?"

"I wanna see what's inside it!" the girl replied.

"Aah... Figures..." Alice shrugged with an understanding look. But as she was thinking of how to deal with this enthusiastic troublemaker, an idea struck her. An idea that could quite easily kill two birds with one stone.

"You know what, how about this?" Alice said, catching the umbrella girl's attention. "Why don't we settle this with a little match of Danmaku? If I win, you'll stop bothering us for the day and if you win, we'll show you what's inside the box."

"Huh? Miss Alice, what are you...?"

"It's a deal!" Kogasa replied with excitement, as she jumped up high in the air, but instead of falling back to the ground, she remained floating a little below the trees' branches. On any other occasion, Engineer would've stared at the sight in disbelief, but now he had a bit more important issues at hand.

"What are you saying? I said I brought this thing with me as a reassurance, I'm not going to show it to just anybo..."

"Rest assured", Alice said in a calm voice, as her dolls began to take up their weapons again, "I don't feel like losing to some prankster like her today. And besides, it's better to see for yourself how things work in this world."

Engineer was a bit lost on the meaning behind her words, but as he saw the puppeteer taking out some more of those mysterious cards and the mystery girl doing the same, he recalled the conversation they had just before the intervention.

"And you might want to take cover, mister Dell. This could get ugly..."

* * *

Mystia's house stood quietly on the edge of the Forest of Magic, as the cool morning breeze gently swayed the building's lanterns.

After the sparrow's fame had reached to the point that she wasn't able to maintain her business with a portable stand alone, she had reached out to fellow youkai and her regular customers, asking for help to build a new place to sustain her business. And for a more permanent residence.

And just two weeks later, a new building had risen next to the road that bordered the Misty Lake, giving a nice view of the Scarlet Devil Mansion on the opposing shore of the lake. According to Bunbunmaru Newspaper, this was apparently "the first time in a while" when youkai and humans had joined forces like that for a common effort.

Opposed to the portable stand's seats for five, the new restaurant had seats for about thirty people, with one table for every four set of seats, and couple of extras next to the grill. The center of the restaurant was dominated by a large round pile of cobblestone, a couple of feet high and about double of that in diameter, with a concave surface on the top of the pile serving as a fireplace. Though initially planned to warm up the place in cold winter nights, Mystia had found it quite useful as an additional way to prepare her meals on a bit busier nights. The fireplace was surrounded by a sturdy wooden railing, just wide enough to have one's drinks on it while having a chat around the fire. And above this all was a wide chimney flue, hanging near the ceiling, but just close enough to the fireplace to capture most of the smoke.

And on the other side of the grill were all the common necessities of your average kitchen: shelves filled with ingredients, tools of food preparation and - something Mystia hasn't been too familiar with until recently - a refrigerator, built by the kappa. And on the floor was a wooden hatch, leading to a cellar filled with a bit more - as locals would call them - "exotic" ingredients.

Though not initially planned, the kappa of the work group had insisted to try out their new digging device, supposedly far superior to their previous gadgets of that sorts. And surprising to most, digging up the cellar and setting it up as a food storage was one of the least time consuming parts in those whole two weeks. And thanks to that, Mystia has been able to expand her menu by testing out new foreign dishes, next on her list being an outside world delicacy known as the "Ham Baaga".

But on little mornings like these, all one really need is a hearty meal, such as a one with two well-baked eggs.

* * *

"And heeere you go", Mystia said cheerfully as she reached out her hand with a plate of omelette, which Kyouko took in her grip. "Another fine start for another fine day."

"Th... Thank you..." Kyouko mumbled, as she placed the plate on the table and began to dig it down with a pair of chopsticks.

While Mystia was cleaning the dishes, she couldn't help but wonder about Kyouko's over-worried look. And as the gloominess didn't seem to decrease along with the dish, Mystia couldn't help but feel a bit worried herself that even her cookings aren't enough to cheer her friend up.

"Geez, Kyouko, just cheer up would you?" Mystia finally said with a bit of a scolding tone, as she finished cleaning up. "This is really not like you. Did something happen at the temple, or what?"

As Mystia had mentioned the word "temple", Kyouko began to cough, apparently after swallowing her mouthful the wrong way.

"E-Eeh? For real? Kyouko, you haven't got yourself into trouble with them, have you? I thought they were fine with this hobby of ours..."

After Kyouko had cleared up her throat, she looked a bit hesitant at first, but finally decided to speak up.

"It's not like that, really. I just... had a little disagreement... with Ichirin."

Now even though Mystia didn't know the folks living in this new temple that well, she had seen some of them couple of times at the Village, and some of them have paid a visit to her grill as well. And out of all of them, only one of the group seemed to fit best to her image of this Ichirin.

"So, this Ichirin... Is she the one with the sailor uniform and that large anchor?" Mystia tried to make sure of her assumption.

This made Kyouko give a bit confused look on the sparrow.

"Uuh... No, that's Murasa", Kyouko replied, making the sparrow give a bit surprised look. "Ichirin is the one with... one with..."

Kyouko had a little moment of consideration, as she tried to think of something that would make Mystia recognize the individual in question. And after a while, she decided to do what she does best, as she cleared up her throat a bit and put her hand gently on her chest.

"She's the one with this kind of voice", Kyouko said with a gentle voice, one clearly not her own.

"Huh? The nun in blue?" Mystia said, as she recognized the voice's owner from her few encounters with the Myouren folk. "How did you end up arguing with _her_?"

"Well, last time when we..." Kyouko was about to say, when she realized she was still imitating Ichirin's voice, making her cough up a bit to loosen up her throat. "Ahem... So, last time when we had our performance a few weeks back, I forgot I had promised to help Ichirin with some chores that night. When I finally got back to the temple, she was waiting for me, steamingly mad at that. She scolded me quite a bit for neglecting my duties, and... I might've said some bad things to her as well... and then... and then..."

Based on the yamabiko's expression, Mystia felt that now she's getting to the part where she explains why she's so stressed-out.

"And then she said she would bring the house down next time I show up late! Now everyone's gonna have to build a new temple just because of me!" Kyouko concluded, with a slight tears flowing down her cheeks.

"...Eh?" Mystia sounded. "Uhm... Kyouko, I don't think she meant it... You know, literally."

"Eh?" Kyouko sounded, looking genuinely surprised.

Uuuh... She _still_ takes things to heart this easily? Mystia thought, as she formed a palm on her face.

"Y-You know, she probably just wanted you to consider your promises more seriously and all, so you wouldn't just thoughtlessly promise things you find hard to keep, and... and...", Mystia tried to explain, but as the yamabiko's expression stayed confused, Mystia decided to keep it simple. "It's a figure of speech!"

"Oooh", Kyouko said, having a bit more better grasp on what the sparrow was getting at, "the thing when you say something but you mean something else?"

"Yes, that!"

"Oh, I'm glad. And here I thought she really would crash the place up with Unzan", Kyouko said with a relieved voice, but something about the words stroke Mystia as odd.

Huh...? Is this Ichirin... Actually capable of doing something like that?

"Y-Yeah", Mystia tried to stay positive that she was right.

"...But she's probably still mad about me not being there, though", Kyouko stated, when she finally thought about it again.

"...Yeah, probably", Mystia had to concur, as she couldn't really think that being late is the most plausible thing to do.

But a sudden knocking on the front door brought the conversation to a well-timed conclusion, as they both now had their eyes locked on the other side of the building.

"Good morning, Mysti-san!" a carefree voice responded from the other side of the door. "Are you awake, 'cause the chimney says you are~!"

"Oh, it's that time of the day already?" Mystia said, taking a quick glance on the clock hanging next to the refrigerator. "Kyouko, could you please go get the door for me?"

"Eh? Oh, sure... Who?" Kyouko thought out loud, as she didn't really recognize the owner of the voice just now.

Mystia began to take some plates off the shelf as the yamabiko opened the door.

"...Ah? Who would you be? A friend of the owner, perha..." BAM!

The sudden bang almost made Mystia drop the plates, but she managed to balance them back on her lap swiftly enough. As soon as she set them down on the table, she turned her head on the front door to see what the bang was about.

"M-Mysti!" Kyouko exclaimed with a terrified look on her face. "T-There was a giant fish eating someone's legs outside!"

"A what eating _what_?" Mystia asked, a bit confused on what her friend was getting at, because she knew that the one behind the door was just a...

"...Oh, that's right. You were living up on a mountain before moving to the temple, you probably haven't seen a mermaid before."

"Huh? A mere... maid?" Kyouko said, completely lost on this new odd word. And while she was spacing out, she failed to notice the door opening behind her.

"Owie... What was that for? Right on my nose..." the mermaid in question weeped, rubbing her sore nose as she crawled her way in, dragging her tail on the ground as she moved forward.

"I'm sorry, Wakasagi-san", Mystia said in a friendly manner, "this is just her first time meeting one of your kind. Please forgive her."

The mermaid replied with a little nod, as she cautiously tried to feel if it was okay to twitch her nose a bit. And after some time with her strange faces, the mermaid finally settled with a cute, clumsy smile.

"Now, I didn't have your breakfast ready yet", Mystia said, as she took out some fish meat and began to roast it, "but I hope some salmon sandwich will do until then."

"Yay, salmon", the mermaid rejoiced as she dragged herself across the floor, past the cobblestone fireplace and up on one of the chairs next to the grill. And all this time, the yamabiko had just starred at this stranger's tail, still not quite convinced it's not some giant leg-eating fish youkai.

"I... guess I have some explaining to do..." Mystia said, when she finally noticed the yamabiko's intense stare. "But first things first: Kyouko, I'd like you to meet Wakasagi-san, a mermaid from the Misty Lake and my new neighbor."

"Nice to meetcha, Kyouko-chan!"

* * *

Not long after the morning's spectacle, there was a little incident that occurred at the Youkai Mountain, near the kappa's residence. While the strange particles were still falling down from the sky, some sort of a large metallic container had came crashing down the mountain, eventually ending up at the Untrodden Valley. Fortunately, since one of the crash sites ended up near the valley, no major casualties were made by this container, when most of the kappa were checking out the crash site.

While the kappa were most excited by these peculiarities from the outside world, the leader of the tengu felt it necessary to go investigate the container's source. The task to send someone up the mountain was forwarded to one of the leaders of the Tengu Patrol, and after some intense consideration, the task to go and investigate was placed upon one of the fastest tengus on the mountain. Though, from this particular tengu's point of view...

"Ayaaa! How could you do this Momiji, right on this kind of a morning?!" Aya cursed as she was flying up the Youkai Mountain, circling around to check out every hole and rock the landmark contained. "What if something happens down there? Who would be there to capture the next big scoop? Why didn't you send that Hatanewb up here inste...? Aya?"

And after her wide and long search, she finally found what she was looking for.

The thing that caught her attention seemed to be a facility of some kind, that had neatly taken residence on the side of the Mountain. It's quite a sight, as the rock on the mountain and the rock where the facility rest upon were both entirely different type, giving a pretty strong impression of an act of cut-n-paste. The facility consisted mostly of red-ish wooden buildings - some of them having "Jenkin Coal Co." labeled on them - with a few exceptions of blue-ish concrete buildings, and a lot of railroads going around the place.

And by these few concrete buildings, Aya spotted some cut off wires, with signs of broken rock on the side of the Mountain below them. And as she took some distance from the facility, she noticed that these traces of broken rock made a rather straight line down the Mountain, to the general direction of the Untrodden Valley.

So that container was hanging by those wires, and them being cut made it come crashing down the Mountain, Aya thought as she went to take a bit closer look on some of the broken rocks.

"Well, since Momiji didn't tell me to do anything else other than find the source, I guess my work here is done", Aya said with a satisfied grin on her face. But as Aya was about to take a dive down back to the foot of the Mountain...

"Yo, dudes, this ain't funny anymore!" Aya suddenly heard from the facility, ending up making a little U-turn in the air. She quickly flew above the facility, and after a quick glance around, she managed to pinpoint the source; a young man with a red shirt and a shotgun on his shoulder.

"You know what, let's make a deal, listen up: You guys come out within the next 5 minutes, starting now, and I won't hit you. With my shotgun. Much. And if you won't come out, I'll smack your head in. For free. When I find you. With my shotgun. Much. There, like it, sound good? Now come out already, dammit, this seriously ain't funny anymore! Don't make me come over there, wherever you are!"

Boastful. Talkative. Distinctively dumb. When it comes to interviewees, these are Aya's top 3 favorite traits.

"Why hellooooo scoop", Aya said with a wide grin on her face, as she took out her pen and notebook, and took a dive towards this mystery facility.

* * *

Chapter 4 Afterword:

Even though I _did_ said there would be ridiculous gaps between chapters, this was definitely _not_ what I had in mind. =(

But anyway, after 9 months since the third chapter, I present to you: the fourth chapter... Lol.

Well, not much to say here now, I just hope that writing the fifth chapter won't take as long. But if I may add: Yay for the first Touhou mermaid! =3


End file.
